Canton — Emma Spathakis played a similar role during field hockey season, when she helped will an inexperienced Stonington High School team to a state championship appearance.

Again this spring, Spathakis was the only senior starter on a Stonington girls’ lacrosse team which ended its season Friday with a 17-12 loss to Canton in the quarterfinals of the Class S state tournament.

The Bears finished 17-3 with an Eastern Connecticut Conference Division II regular-season title.

“I think they have a lot of potential,” Spathakis said of the future of her teammates. “For field hockey, same thing; it’s very similar. It’s crazy how such a young team of sophomores mostly, and freshmen for lacrosse, stepped up and fit the varsity roles.

“We never played with each other until this year and we were all able to really connect and play as a team and we had an amazing season. Somehow, it seems like we’ve been playing with each other for a long time, even though we haven’t.”

Fifth-seeded Stonington rebounded from a 3-1 deficit early against No. 4 Canton, tying things at 3-3 on goals by Emma Logel and Lillian Loughlean and taking the lead with 16 minutes, 17 seconds remaining in the first half on a bouncer by Loughlean.

Canton answered with three straight goals, however, to go up 6-4. Spathakis scored for Stonington to pull within 6-5, but Canton got consecutive goals by Ellie Bahre, both with a man advantage, to take an 8-5 lead at the 6:09 mark.

Canton led 9-6 at halftime and held at least a two-goal edge for the remainder of the game.

Bahre and Heather Delbone scored five goals each for Canton, which advanced to meet No. 1 Weston in the semifinals Wednesday at a site and time to be announced.

Spathakis and Logel scored three goals each for Stonington to go with two for Loughlean.

Stonington coach Jeff Medeiros thought the Bears looked “flat.” Part of the explanation for that is that the Bears, despite their regular-season record of 15-1, were forced to take the two-hour bus ride to Canton in the first place.

Canton had a regular-season record of 12-4 but the CIAC, for the first time, changed the way it figured its boys’ and girls’ lacrosse rankings this year, using a formula known as LaxNumbers.

LaxNumbers assigns a rating for teams based on average goal differential and strength of schedule. Canton had a rating of 76.63, while Stonington’s rating was 76.53. Under the old formula, Stonington would have played the game at home.

“Canton, they’re a good team,” Medeiros said. “They’ve got a strong defense, a lot of big girls on defense. But it was a long, hot ride in a town we shouldn’t be in because they changed the ratings system this year.

“We should have been a No. 1 seed. The whole fact we had to travel in this game is disappointing. The best record in the (division) is a fifth seed because my strength of schedule isn’t up to par. So the record doesn’t seem to matter.

“So I had to travel. That matters in a game like this. We took a two-hour ride on a hot bus on a hot day, so OK, we were a little flat. We didn’t want to be. We tried not to be, but it’s hard not to be.”

The Canton defense, anchored by 6-foot-2 Sophia Mates, was another problem for the Bears. Taking a crack at a free position for Stonington with 19:05 remaining, Spathakis finally shot from a good distance from the goal, before the defense could stand in her way.

Spathakis and Medeiros each credited the Canton defense.

Both also believe the Bears, who had four first team ECC Division II all-stars, three underclassmen, will be back in this spot.

“We’re a young team. We’ll be able to rebound off of this,” Medeiros said. “This is a stepping stone. This was a good group of girls and they did accomplish a lot.”

v.fulkerson@theday.com