It's on to 'the promised land' for Old Lyme girls

Montville — As far as Old Lyme coach Don Desautels was concerned, a 1-0 lead at halftime wasn't good enough, with way much too leeway for a single mistake to send his team home unhappy.

As far as St. Bernard coach Chris Ghiglia was concerned, his team was playing against the eventual Class S state champion.

"We have a couple kids that are fast," Ghiglia said. "But they weren't able to neutralize that."

The "that" to which Ghiglia referred was Old Lyme High School's game of poise and possession. The top-seeded Wildcats (20-0-1) were bigger, faster, stronger as they beat St. Bernard 4-0 in the Class S girls' soccer semifinals, without allowing the No. 12 Saints a shot.

That earned Old Lyme, the winner of 20 straight games, its first trip to the state championship game since 2004. The Wildcats will meet defending champion Immaculate of Danbury in the finals either Friday or Saturday at a site and time to be announced, facing the team that has been its foil recently in Class S play.

Immaculate, the No. 3 seed, beat Old Lyme in its last two championship appearances, as well as knocking the Wildcats out in the quarterfinals a year ago. The Mustangs won their semifinal game 5-1 Tuesday over Shepaug Valley of Washington.

"They're 20-0, maybe they were thinking, 'What's this guy just yelling for the heck of it?'" said Desautels of his halftime address.

"(The second half), they just played the way they should. I don't know how many minutes the ball did not cross that 'M' (in the center of the artificial turf field at Montville High School). I think we looked really strong in the second half."

Old Lyme scored the only goal of the first half on a throw-in from the right side by Alina Byrne. The throw, which was delayed while a substitute for St. Bernard that was originally allowed was sent off the field, landed just in front of the St. Bernard goal. Vanessa Mesham converted for the 1-0 lead 4 minutes, 36 seconds into the game.

The rest of the half, Old Lyme did a good job possessing the ball, but sprayed its shots wide of the goal.

Brittany Cowee blocked an attempted defensive clear and missed a one-on-one with the goalie over the top of the crossbar. Cowee also knocked a shot from the right side of the goal headed to the left that was saved by St. Bernard goalie Chelsea Shirshac, who finished with eight saves.

"We had about 10 minutes (at the end of the first half) where we weren't talking and didn't go to the ball," Byrne said. "(Desautels told us to) up our game again, get our heads out of the sand."

The second goal came 8:17 into the second half, when Cowee was driving inside the penalty box. A St. Bernard defender fell and in the process of protecting herself touched the ball with her hand. Old Lyme was awarded a penalty kick, which was converted by Tanya Price.

Byrne made it 3-0 unassisted with 20:25 remaining, dribbling in and connecting on a ground ball. Nicole Tiffany scored the final goal with 9:02 to go on a pass back by Mesham, rocketing it high into the net.

"We have great team. It took all of us to do it," Byrne said.

"I told them, 'T hank you for taking me back to the promised land,'" Desautels said.

St. Bernard was last year's Class S runner-up, but suffered several key losses from that team. Ghiglia was pleased for the Saints to make it make to the semifinals.

"To get to the semifinal," he said, "that's a big accomplishment."

v.fulkerson@theday.com