Girls’ Lax Loses Close Matchup
Exeter’s girls lacrosse took on Northfield Mount Hermon on the home turf this past Saturday. The game was close and hard fought, but the girls didn’t quite pull through, dropping the contest 7-8. With the outcome of the game varing from year to year, the team entered the game with everything up in the air, winner takes all. According to the team, the winner should’ve easily been Exeter this year, but distractions and mistakes stole the win for NMH. This specific loss against NMH hit the girls particularly hard with the score not accurately depicting what truly happened in the game.
“We had the game in our hands and could have physically beaten this team any day, but mentally we weren’t focused and intense enough for the whole 50 minutes and it showed in the end of the second half.”
At halftime, Big Red was winning by quite a margin, the score at 6-2. The girls started the game out strong, digging for the balls and finding openings. Among the scorers were senior and co-captain Marley Jenkins, lower Eloise Shields, senior and co-captain Elsa Chinburg, lower Emily Ryan and upper Bronwyn Shields.
Upper and goalie Allegra Grant attributed Big Red’s soaring success in the first half to the strength of their defense. “The defense did a great job making sure that their attackers didn’t have many offensive opportunities,” Grant said.
In the second half, things took a turn for the worse. NMH swiped six goals off the girls in the second half, while Big Red struggled to slip in even a single goal.
Jenkins concluded two main reasons for the girls loss of control and NMH’s lucky comeback in the second half: the girls’ low shot/goal percentage and unforced errors when passing the ball. “We had 28 shots but only 7 of them went in. We did badly with our shooting because we often took rushed shots right to the goalie’s stick. We were working well together but our shooting was lacking,” Jenkins said. “We also had a lot of unforced turnovers when passing the ball, which didn’t help us.”
The worst part of the loss to the team was that it was their fault for the most part. Unlike previous losses, this defeat could have been prevented. Ryan echoed the team’s disappointment and sentiment, saying, “We had the game in our hands and could have physically beaten this team any day, but mentally we weren’t focused and intense enough for the whole 50 minutes and it showed in the end of the second half.”
The main focus for the team this week in practice has been shooting in hopes of avoiding a recurrence of the events against NMH. The girls have been practicing driving the ball to the net, shooting harder and placing the ball better, taking the sharp angles.
Hopefully the team will have the opportunity to put their newly improved shooting to the test at their next game at Milton Academy. With the record currently at 2-3, the girls will be looking to get back to .500 with a win.