Stonington falls in girls' lacrosse quarters
Manchester — There is little solace on the day the season ends, but at least there’s this for Stonington High School: The Bears lost to a team with a Division I lacrosse player who surely plays the part.
Alexa Weber, headed to Bryant University next year, scored four straight goals in the second half to snap a 7-7 tie — six goals in the second half overall — and helped No. 3 East Catholic oust No. 6 Stonington 14-11 in the Class S quarterfinals.
East eliminated Waterford earlier this week, keeping its record unblemished lately against the Eastern Connecticut Conference.
“She’s an athlete,” a very good player,” Stonington coach Jeff Medeiros said. “It wasn’t just her. They have other good athletes, too.”
And East’s athletes are used to their home field of grass, unlike the turf on which Stonington has played most of the season.
“I thought that was the real difference,” Medeiros said. “It’s tough to play on this thing. We played once all year on grass and this stuff is really thick.”
East led 7-4 at halftime and threatened to extend the lead early in the second half, thwarted three different times by Stonington goalie Alexis Scott. Stonington capitalized with three straight goals — two from Hannah Lamb — to tie the game at 7 with 17:56 left.
East coach Brian Wilcox called a quick timeout, leading to Weber’s four straight goals.
“The timeout stopped the momentum,” Medeiros said. “They got a couple of quick transitions after that.”
Weber’s fourth straight goal made it 11-7 with 9:28 left.
Emma Sabbadini’s fourth goal of the game got the Bears to 13-10 with 3:04 left, but East’s Ava Ecklund scored on her team’s next possession to all but ice it.
Cat Cassata and Kathryn Logel also scored two goals apiece for Stonington.
And so while the Bears left the grassy field disappointed, they also experienced quite the exciting week. Seven days earlier, they won the ECC championship at East Lyme. They made the quarterfinals of the state tournament earlier this week. And were it not for a Division I player …
“We expected to go far this year,” Medeiros said. “We knew we had some talent. We were confident going to East Lyme. It was big because an ECC title had eluded us. We thought we’d go further in the state tournament, but we’re not disappointed.”
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