East Lyme — With this team, it’s so hard to overlook the big picture.

Ten seniors gone from last year’s Stonington High School field hockey team which was the Class S state runner-up, two returning senior starters, sophomores everywhere ... and as of Thursday afternoon’s 1-0 victory over Fitch, the Eastern Connecticut Conference tournament champion.

The Bears, 14-2-1, were also the league’s regular-season champ.

“I was one of the starters last year and we lost all of them,” said Stonington senior and left halfback Emma Spathakis, named the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player.

“I was not expecting to be the ECC title-winners and win this championship. I wasn’t expecting it at all. It’s just crazy. The sophomore class really stepped up this year and helped us out. It’s so crazy. How are we even at this point right now? I would never expect losing (10) seniors last year and to be at the point we are right now. It’s crazy.”

Stonington’s Nora Walsh scored the game’s only goal assisted by Brianna Plew off a penalty corner with 6 minutes, 43 seconds remaining in the first quarter and the Bears made that stand.

There were only six total shots in the game, although Stonington had nine corner opportunities to one for Fitch. Mainly, it was a defensive effort, with Stonington, needing just one save from goalie Madi Allard, recording its 10th shutout.

It was the third one-goal game of the season against Fitch (13-5), which eclipsed its program record for wins in a season this year but couldn’t topple the Bears.

Stonington beat Fitch, the defending ECC tournament champion, 2-1 on Sept. 20 and 1-0 on Oct. 14.

“We know their strategy,” Stonington coach Jenna Tucchio said of facing Fitch for a third time. “My backfield knew exactly what they needed to do. They stayed pretty calm because they knew, ‘All right, this is what’s going to happen.’ The kids were comfortable.”

Tucchio chose to keep Spathakis — one of two returning starters along with Allard in goal — at left halfback instead of moving her to the middle of the field.

“I think that her effectiveness there is just unsurpassed,” Tucchio said. “She’d do fine at center half, but she’s so effective and she leads so well from there. She just does great things.”

Tucchio said she always tells her team not to judge a book by its cover with regard to its opponents. But she directed the Bears to apply that rule to themselves this year, as well, especially following a rocky preseason and a 5-0 early-season loss to Guilford.

“I said, ‘Don’t do it to yourselves either,’” Tucchio said. “’Don’t prejudge what you’re capable of doing in this season. The sky’s the limit. Let’s see how far we can go. Don’t prejudge yourself and what we can and can’t be.’

“Every day we got better.”

Since then, the season has included a 1-0 win over previously unbeaten North Branford, the team which beat the Bears for the 2021 Class S championship and is currently ranked fourth in the state coaches’ poll.

“Definitely, I wanted to prove that we still had it in us,” Spathakis said. “My senior year, I wanted to, like, try our hardest to get my team to be competitive. (North Branford) was definitely the biggest game of this year that I’m still shocked at.

“We knew Fitch was like that too, we knew they wanted it. We knew we’ve got to bring it, too.”

Fitch got the ball into the open field with about 5:00 remaining in the third quarter when defender Ada Ellis broke up a Stonington corner and crossed midfield with it. The Falcons also had a corner in the fourth quarter.

Fitch coach Diane Kolnaski, however, said her team was too anxious to score at times.

“For whatever reason, they were looking for a faster way to score,” Kolnaski said. “We needed to look for the right opportunity and not lose the ball to the defense.

“We’ve scored, as a team, more goals than last year but today we were a little bit off as far as timing and being patient and looking for the best opportunity. Overall, I’m never disappointed with the effort they put out. My attack is a great attack.

“We’re going to let this one go and look ahead to the state and think about what we want to do a little bit different. Stonington got the win today. They got the goal. They deserved to win today.”

v.fulkerson@theday.com