South Girls Lacrosse Takes Small Steps Against L-S

Facing Lincoln-Sudbury has been no easy task for Newton South girls' lacrosse, but the Lions have made small strides against the Warriors this season.

Improving from its 25-0 season opening loss to L-S, South managed to touch net twice in a 20-2 loss to the host Warriors on Tuesday.

“We are playing against a group of kids where a lot of them are going to play in college or on national teams,” said South coach Katie Neal-Rizzo. “It is tough to compete, but we kept the score closer than last time.

The Warriors (11-1, 8-0 in the Dual County League) opened the game by winning the first ten draws to pull ahead 9-0.

South (5-5, 1-5 in the Dual County League) struggled throughout the game to possess the ball on its half of the field and took ten minutes to control the ball more than thirty seconds.

“Whenever we did make a turnover, we were unable to transition to our offense,” said  Neal-Rizzo. “We were looking to set up plays, but we did not really get a lot of opportunities to move the ball around.”

Patiently bobbling the ball between cuts toward the net, L-S senior Jenna Kabat found a gap in front of the crease to open the scoring at 22:47. Thirteen minutes later, Kabat would rip a free position shot from the top of the box to put the Warriors up 9-0.

“Today was all about possessing the ball,” said L-S coach Deb DeJesus. “We can be impatient at times so we were looking to be patient and get a good shot.”

The Lions managed to both open their scoring and win their first draw in immediate succession.

On a counter attack, senior Yudit Bolotovskava used her shoulder to gain position then cut under her defender to score at 5:55. Seconds later South out bodied the Warriors for its first draw.

“We had a freshman doing that draw for her height,” said Neal-Rizzo. “We tried to score on breakaways because we did not really have possession.”

Winning twelve of the fifteen first half draws, L-S entered the break up 13-1.

Starting the second half in similar manner, the Warriors went three straight in both draws and goals. After opening the half with a hat trick net from freshman Eliza Guild, Kabat received a cross the crease pass to complete her third goal and give L-S a 16-1 lead at 16:20.

“Defensively we were just trying to pressure the ball more and not let them play keep away too much,” said Neal-Rizzo. “We did not want (our team) getting frustrated on defense.”

South scored its final goal off a front of the net shot from sophomore Kayla Kee. Using her back to gain position, Kee spun around and over shot a wall of defenders to finish top net at 12:56.

L-S responded with three goals in the next ten minutes to finish the scoring.

“We were focused on turnovers in midfield and keeping the ball in our sticks,” said DeJesus. “We did not want to let them get the ball.”

South travels to play Newton North (7-2) at 4 p.m. on Thursday.