ST. MARY’S GIRLS LACROSSE FALLS IN OVERTIME
Maryvale stuns St. Mary’s as Savage nets overtime winner
It didn’t faze Maryvale Prep when St. Mary’s took a two-goal lead to put it on the ropes in the second half.
It simply battled back.
It didn’t bother the Lions when the Saints netted a go-ahead goal with only seconds left in regulation. Instead, they just threw the kitchen sink.
“We had nothing to lose at that point,” Maryvale coach Kim Dubansky said. “May as well go as hard as anything. I think that’s a hard thing to defend.”
The Lions’ Payton Rowley tied the game with two seconds left and Courtney Savage scored the game-winner shortly into overtime to give Maryvale a 9-8 win in Annapolis on Wednesday.
Rowley scored four goals to lead Maryvale to its second straight win.
“We never gave up as a team,” Savage said. “That was definitely a team win.”
Though Maryvale got a two-goal jump on St. Mary’s, the Saints forced the Lions to turn the ball over eight times in the first half, preventing them from building any kind of momentum.
Dubanksy said her players needed time adjusting to the rainy conditions and slick field. Once they did, they needed to learn how to be a little more patient with the ball — and quickly.
“We had people step up at meaningful times,” Dubansky said. “I asked, who wants the ball? You got to want the ball out there. And they’re all like, ‘I want the ball.’
“Pretty cool to have a team that all wants the ball. You could see that when it came down to pressure time.”
For a while, every time St. Mary’s gained an inch on Maryvale with a goal, the Lions has an answer.
Rowley proved how much of a threat to the Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland she is, netting three of the visitors’ first four goals. On the latter, she scooped up a ground ball from teammate Annabelle Jackson (one goal) in a flash and shot it before the Saints defenders could see it again.
But there was another standout on the other side of the field.
Saints junior Gracie Driggs (two goals) put pressure on the Lions’ defense every time she neared, a force Maryvale couldn’t stop, and she eventually netted her first goal.
After teammate Kyra Obert (three goals) cut the deficit to one with a penalty shot late in the first half, Driggs was not content with
meeting the buzzer behind the Lions.
The junior charged Maryvale’s defense, earned a penalty shot of her own, and fired in the game-tying goal. The teams went into halftime tied at 4-all.
Even as Maryvale attackers charged, the Saints had an ace in the cage. Goalkeeper Madigan Brewer, in her first year starting in the net, fended off multiple Maryvale pointblank shots, including a few penalty shots, and ultimately recorded six saves.
With their indelible keeper holding down the fort, Obert and Meghan O’Hare (three goals) got to work, netting goals to claim a 6-4 lead.
Maryvale did not act as though all was lost. Instead, they made things interesting.
Sisters Lauren and Courtney Savage descended upon Brewer and buried their goals to tie the game at 6-all.
“They have great speed and shiftiness, and they have terrific chemistry — given that they’d been playing together for ages,” Dubansky said. “Both of their endurance is really strong and they’re very hard workers. … I think it shows. “
Maryvale took the lead once again, but St. Mary’s, though it was a man down, grabbed it right back as Obert and O’Hare scored. The latter did so with about 15 seconds left, sparking jubilant screams from their teammates on the sideline.
St. Mary’s coach Mindy Jones expressed pride in a pair of sophomores who had nearly no time to develop as freshman on varsity last year before the pandemic cut their season off.
“For them both to step up today just shows the talent that we have coming up in our program,” Jones said. “It really feeds our team because they see these young girls stepping up and playing. It was huge. It was the momentum that we needed.
“If we only had 15 seconds less.”
Maryvale caught St. Mary’s, rich with adrenaline, thinking it had the win in hand. Rowley got the ball and fired with just two seconds on the board.
The momentum on their side, the Lions made short work of their hosts in overtime as Savage ended it.
The junior attacker knows wins like this will send a message to the rest of the IAAM A Conference.
“I think that shows really well for what’s coming ahead this season,” she said. “We’ve had some upsets compared to last seasons and I think that’ll carry really well into the rest of the season.”