Girls lacrosse: York scoring spurt key to beating Montini

Sixes were wild for the York girls lacrosse team Friday afternoon in its nonconference matchup with visiting Montini.

With six minutes to go in the first half and the score tied 4-4, the Dukes suddenly kicked their offense into high gear, scoring 6 unanswered goals before the end of the half.

That's right - quite literally a goal a minute, which was the difference for York as it grabbed the 13-7 victory over the Broncos and junior Northwestern recruit Johanna Kingsfield.

"We really talked, just talked about as a team what was working well," said senior midfielder Emily Siegenthaler, who scored four times, including the goal that started the scoring spurt at the six-minute mark, on a dead-out sprint from the left.

"We kind of realized the fast breaks were what was really getting us on offense, so we kind of just strategically planned our plays on what we were going to do to our advantage and our strengths as a team."

After Siegenthaler got things going sophomore midfielder Cate Duhig took over. She spun on a defender to score into the center of the net at 4:22, then depositing another in a crowd dead center at 3:33. That last goal happened after she won the draw and drove the ball down, before she and her teammates passed the ball around the perimeter.

After goals by a pair of freshmen midfielders, Ellie Bertrand and Emily Fleckenstein, it was Duhig again, firing another shot in from the center with 41.1 seconds. That gave York (2-5) a 10-4 lead it never relinquished.

"Our clears and transitions were excellent, and then we kind of just settled things in," York coach Ryan Walz said of that first-half spurt.

It was more of the same to start the second half. Senior attack Ellie Grubbs and Fleckenstein both scored in the half's first three minutes. But according to Duhig, the key was the team mentality heading into the half.

"We always look at the score at halftime and we're like, 'The score is 0-0, we've still got to keep pushing just as hard as the first half,'" said Duhig, who also tallied four times on a cold, clammy and occasionally rainy afternoon. "We may be up, but it might be a quick turnaround, especially with a team like (Montini)."

The Broncos (4-4) looked to be a stiff challenge for the Dukes early, with Kingsfield scoring twice early. But that's all she would get due to a swarming York defense that keyed on her.

Instead, Montini had to pivot to senior attack Grayson Clynch and junior attack Ellie Czaplicki, who scored within 13 seconds of each other.

But after that came York's goal deluge that put the contest away.

"All I can say is, we're going to be working shooting over and over again for the next couple of days here," said Montini coach Kaitlin Sheridan. "That's really what this game was, shot percentage. We knew we needed to shoot low, and we shot high every time."

Kingsfield agreed with her coach's assessment of the Broncos' shooting woes.

"We definitely have some things to work on in terms of faking the goalie and being in the proper spots," she said. "But it's a work in progress. We'll get there."