Notre Dame Prep rallies, repeats in IAAM A
3-1 win over Garrison Forest caps 20-1 season; St. Mary’s wins ‘B’; Key claims ‘C’
Notre Dame Prep’s senior class closed the curtain on an incredible three-year field hockey run Sunday, during which the Blazers were league finalists three times and won the championship twice, as they overcame an early deficit to claim a 3-1 victory over Garrison Forest at Archbishop Spalding and repeat as Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland A Conference champions.
The area’s top-ranked team all season, the Blazers finished 20-1 — their only loss was to Arundel — and will send nine players to Division I colleges.
The final score against Garrison Forest (18-3) was identical to last season’s final, when the Blazers beat the Grizzlies and finished undefeated. In three seasons at NDP, Katrina Ross has coached the program to three trips to the IAAM A Conference championship game.
“To stay No. 1 the entire season with a target on your back is difficult,” said Ross, who coached at the Division I level before taking a hiatus to raise a family. “To finish the season as we did is special. [The 2-1 loss to Arundel on Oct. 12] was a bump in the road, and we learned from it, but our gals played very well after that game.”
Ross said this group of seniors was one of a kind, but got that way only after years of preparation.
“This team is just special. They have worked extraordinarily hard. But these kids came to us with the talent,” Ross said. “It takes a community to build a team like this. It takes parents taking their kids to practice and it takes good coaching at every level from youth league through club teams on up, and it takes a commitment from the girls at a young age to put the effort into it that is needed. I have benefitted from it as the coach lucky enough to get them at this level.”
The Blazers came into the game having outscored their opponents 118-13 with 13 shutouts and had a string of five consecutive shutouts before the Grizzlies’ Riley Patro scored five minutes into the game for a 1-0 lead.
NDP recovered nicely, though, tying the From left, Liza Regan (10), Olivia Kenny (16), Rachel Borzymowski (18), Meredith Medvetz (24), Pyper Friedman (21) and Nathalie Friedman (20) celebrate Notre Dame Prep’s first goal, which tied the score at 1 in the first half. score 8:41 into the game on a goal by Julia Kraft off an assist by Meredith Medvetz. Nathalie Friedman’s second-half goal on a hard, arcing shot gave the Blazers the lead with 15:15 to play. Senior Rachel Boryzmowski’s penalty shot with 14:14 to go made it 3-1.
The Blazers defense, led by sophomore goalie Brooke Borzymowski (seven saves), blanked the Grizzlies over the final 55 minutes. The closest Garrison Forest came to scoring in the second half was an apparent goal at the 10-minute mark, which was ruled to have been kicked.
“It feels so great to achieve this together,” said Boston University-bound Rachel Borzymowski. “To come back like we did and shut them down the rest of the game shows how determined we were. We haven’t given up too many goals this season.”
Friedman, who is headed for Wake Forest, played three seasons for Ross.
“It’s so great to have been part of this, to come together as a program. We never had anything like this before, then to go back-to-back, it’s something I’ll never forget,” Friedman said.
Garrison Forest had five shots at halftime, but got only two in the second half. After seven corners in the first half, it had just four in the second half.
“We got a goal early, but it was their night tonight,” said Garrison Forest coach Traci Davis, who started just three seniors. “We figured they would be relentless and they were. But it has been an exciting season for us, we have a phenomenal group of athletes.”
B Conference
There will be a newbanner hanging in the St. Mary’s gymnasium.
In just their first season as members of the IAAM B conference, the St. Mary’s field hockey team clinched its first title on Sunday afternoon.
First-year coach Kaitlyn Marsh was brimming with emotion as she embraced her blissful players postgame. She has every intention of wearing her medal to school today.
“We’ve been visualizing this since the start of playoffs and this has been the end goal,” she said. “And they got it.”
It took two halves and two overtime periods, but the Saints were the ones celebrating at the end. Freshman Gracie Driggs tipped in the game-winner as St. Mary’s defeated Mount de Sales, 1-0.
“Gracie Driggs is great, a great athlete,” Marsh said. “She didn’t have her best game today and she turned it on in overtime. What better way to turn it on and redeem yourself?”
The Saints will likely return a bulk of their roster next season, with 13 juniors, six sophomores and Driggs eligible to try for the repeat next fall.
For now, though, the freshman will bask in the feeling few newcomers ever get to have so quickly.
“It’s so cool to do this,” Driggs said. “I can’t believe it.”
C Conference
Absolutely nothing was easy for Key on the road to playoff glory.
The predominately sophomore field hockey team played is final two regularseason weeks laden with games and makeups, completely knackered heading into the postseason.
Then, as if that wasn’t enough, bad luck struck the Obezags on the bus ride over. A knitting needle to the ankle sent one player to the emergency room, as well as a horribly bad feeling in the minds’ of the rest — “traumatic,” coach Jen Langdon said — especially as the freak accident meant Key was late to warm-ups as well.
“We had 20 minutes to get in our head that we were going to play a hockey game and we were going to win it,” Langdon said.
But when the Obezags stepped off the bus, they were just 90 minutes away from hoisting the IAAM C trophy.
Key (12-6) capitalized on three corners to secure the IAAM C field hockey title — its first since 2015 — by upsetting top-ranked Friends 3-1 on Sunday.
For the three seniors, the victory was a perfect bookend to their high school careers. All three had their first taste of winning a title three years ago, as freshmen on the 2015 champion team.
Senior defender Delaney Snowden was one of them. On Sunday, she led Key with two second-half goals after sophomore forward Addison Neise broke the ice with her first-half goal.
“My last game as a senior was a national championship win. I feel like that really closed it off, correctly seal a chapter off in my life,” Langdon said. “For them, I feel like it gives them a sense of closure that they’ve put everything into it.”