Tuesday night was a tale of two halves for the Acalanes Girls Varsity Lacrosse team as they took on the Monte Vista Mustangs at home. Going into the game, the Dons knew they’d face strong competition from the Mustangs. Monte Vista got started quickly, scoring the first goal of the night. However, Acalanes wasn’t to be deterred and with solid communication and teamwork they took control of the half. Starting with a great save by Senior goalie Addie Martin, the Dons transitioned the ball back to their side of the field where Junior Lucca Debiasse made a cut around the crease to score the first goal for Acalanes. Our trusty starting defenders, Seniors Avery Ives and Kelly Todhunter along with Junior Claire Zimmerman and Freshman Reese Tierney continued to hold off the Mustangs. With another save by Martin, the ball was headed back to our attack with the help of Tierney’s speed taking it down the field. Senior Ella Thomason set up Grace Imrie with an assist, and Imrie scored with a low sliding shot (which some in the stands marveled at, commenting that it looked like a tricky golf shot). With more tenacious defense from Ives to prevent Monte Vista from scoring, the first quarter ended with the Dons up 2-1.
The Dons were optimistic as they went into the second quarter. Freshman Grace Colaco helped gain possession with her relentless pursuit of ground balls off the draw, while Martin continued to work her magic with more thrilling stops in the goal. With the ball settled on offense, Freshman Catalina Liu connected with Sophomore Emily Roberts who made a cut to the middle and scored the third goal of the night off of Liu’s assist. Shortly afterwards, DeBiasse got her second goal on a well placed penalty shot. While the Dons offense was heating up, the defense continued their work with Todhunter disrupting the Mustang’s plans and Martin shutting them down in goal. Before they knew it, the Dons were back on attack as Imrie scored her second goal of the night with a little help from Liu with her second assist. The Dons weren’t quite finished and with 5 seconds left in the half, Colaco made a fantastic assist to Imrie who scored her third goal just before the buzzer rang. The Dons ended what was a fantastic first half up 6-2.
Now, if you were paying attention to the title of this article, you should have a pretty good idea of what is coming next . . . the other half. This portion of the article will be, understandably, a bit shorter. The Dons started the second half with the same good teamwork and communication that we saw in the first half, with Thomason gaining possession on the draw. Both Thomason and Colaco battled and won key ground balls to gain possession, but the ball kept finding its way back to the Monte Vista offense. The Mustangs took the momentum from there and went on a 6 goal scoring streak. Right here, it is important to note that my husband was the one taking notes Tuesday night, and I think his notes pretty much sum up the rest of the second half as he noted the number of saves that (Addie) Martin had in goal during this stretch. His notes read – Addie for the save. Addie again. I said again. Addie is a wall. Addie again . . . she is in their heads. Made them call a timeout. Addie!! And Again! I think you get the point. Martin’s ability to protect our goal, time and time again, was what kept us in the second half despite struggling to score. Colaco had the only goal of the half, converting on a strong penalty shot to tie it 7-7 at the end of regulation, sending the game into overtime. With the Dons’ energy drained, the Mustangs gained the first possession and scored the golden goal to end the game; Dons 7, Mustangs 8. Certainly a tough loss after such a promising first half, but still a strong showing against a good team.
