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Girls lacrosse: Lake Forest overcomes quick start by Stevenson

Jumping out to a 2-0 lead against second-seeded Lake Forest looked like a great sign for top-seeded Stevenson on Friday night in the Warren girls lacrosse sectional championship game.

But that short-lived momentum did not hold true at all for the Patriots on this difficult night, as the Scouts completely turned the tables on Stevenson for pretty much the remainder of the contest en route to an 11-3 victory on their way to the sectional title.

Lake Forest (13-9) next hosts New Trier on Tuesday in its own supersectional championship game, with a trip to the first-ever high school lacrosse state tournament at Hinsdale Central next week at stake.

Stevenson (18-4) looked really sharp in the opening minutes of the first half as sophomore Michelle Shen scored on an assist by junior teammate Georgia Maskalunas to the right of Lake Forest goalkeeper Mary Doheny from close range for a 1-0 lead just 1:14 into the contest.

Then the patient and methodical Patriots struck again on their next possession only 54 seconds later as Maskalunas bounced home a goal from about 10 feet out and straight away from the goalie for a quick 2-0 advantage.

But as fate would have it, momentum and any sort of sustained offensive attack was just not in the cards for Stevenson the rest of the way. The Pats were outshot 28-6 overall as the Scouts took control of the game with an 11-1 run the rest of the contest.

Fouls and yellow cards certainly hurt Stevenson badly, as Lake Forest was able to capitalize on numerous free position shots which resulted in many goals, including 4 goals by senior Audrey Kaus alone.

"I think our first yellow card hurt us in the first half, and they got 2 goals off of that," said Stevenson coach Sara Gutierrez, whose team only trailed 4-2 at halftime. "I think our defense played phenomenally, but it's hard to play defense that long without a break."

Kaus scored a goal on the run with a shot past Stevenson goalkeeper Ryan Johnson (12 saves) only 13 seconds into the second half which was an ominous sign for the Patriots.

Then Johnson came up with a huge save with 18:10 to play to keep the score at 5-2. But shortly after that save, Lake Forest's Caroline Skinner scored on a running shot over the middle from close range and the Scouts were well on their way to victory with a 6-2 lead at that point.

"We are always a very slow starting team, but we knew it was going to be a dogfight, so we slowed it down and played our game," said Lake Forest coach Catherine Catanzaro. "We have four, four-year varsity players, and they're our backbone right now."

Lake Forest really got rolling on offense with many free position shots leading to easy goals, starting with Kara Antonucci's close-range goal for a 7-2 lead with 15:15 to play.

Stevenson junior Sophie Sorenson kept the Pats' hopes alive as she ended their scoring drought with a bounced-home goal from the left wing to cut the gap to 7-3 with 14:49 remaining.

But the Scouts would run the table the rest of the way with two goals by Kaus, a goal by Ginger Leonardi, and another goal by Antonucci accounting for the final score.

"Sophie (Sorenson) being out for the final 13 minutes with two yellow cards hurt us, we were getting a lot of fouls called on us, and they had a lot of free position shots," said Gutierrez, whose team was also without key sophomore Kilian Weber for the game. "We had our opportunities, but I'm proud of the team to get to the sectional championship, and winning the conference so we had a great season."

Lake Forest lost to New Trier in a regular-season contest this spring.

"We were really shaken up at first because we really didn't expect to start like that," said Kaus. "Ultimately we controlled the pace of the game, we are a second-half team, and this means a lot for us seniors to have this moment pay off."

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