For The Dialog
BEAR – The fourth-seeded St Mark’s Spartans built up a six-goal lead and held off a furious rally from the No. 1 seed, Archmere, to take a 14-13 victory on May 23 at Caravel Academy. With the win, the Spartans advance to the state championship Thursday night.
The Auks trailed, 14-8, late in the second half before they made their rally. After Archmere scoried with 46 seconds left, the most important groundball of the game was picked up by St. Mark’s junior Kendra Schweizer, who then ran away from the Auks’ defense to seal the win and send the Spartans to the championship.
It will be the Spartans’ third championship appearance, as they lost to Tower Hill in 2006 and Cape Henlopen in 2010. Winning their first state championship won’t be easy; they will have to defeat eight-time defending champs Cape. The Vikings advanced with a 10-5 win over Ursuline.
The Spartans never trailed and got the first goal from sophomore Megan Noonan. The Auks tied it a minute later as sophomore Caroline Donovan scored. Noonan added two more goals for an early hat trick as the Spartans led, 4-2, with 14:10 left in the first half.
Spartans senior goalkeeper Katharine Giannaras made several of her 15 saves early in the game.
“I’ve hit my point where I’m doing really well at the exact right time and I’m just really happy,” Giannaras said. “This is probably one of my better games I’ve had in a while.”
The Spartans got a fourth first-half goal from Noonan to give them a 6-3 halftime advantage. St. Mark’s added the first three goals after intermission, the last two from Clare Estes to give them a 9-3 lead with 19:03 left.
Archmere’s Sydney Yanick and Julia Collins sandwiched goals around one from from the Spartans’ Paige Megargee to trail, 10-5, with 16:52 left. Estes then added two more plus an assist to give the Spartans a 13-7 lead with 11:20 remaining. Megaragee’s tallied again for the 14-8 Spartans advantage with 7:52 left.
The Auks then showed some life as Kate Olsen scored twice and Yanick and Donovan scored to cut it to 14-13. The Auks, who won a lot of faceoffs in their run, couldn’t get the last ground ball.
The Spartans (15-2) got four goals each from Estes and Noonan, while Schweizer added two goals and 3 assist.
Estes said team cohesion made a difference on Tuesday.
“We came out on top because we are so close as a team and we just got so excited for this game,” she said.
First year coach Lori Schweizer says anything can happen on Thursday night.
“We have been saying this all year long: ATP – all ll things possible. You don’t know when it will be your turn. It’s a game of possessions and circumstances. You get the ball and it’s what you do with it.”
The Auks (15-2) had won 15 straight since a 16-10 loss to St Mark’s to open the season. They got four goals from Collins while Donovan added three.
The championship game will take place at 7 p.m. Thursday at the DE Turf Complex on Route 1 in Frederica. Tickets are $7 and available at statechamps.com/DIAA. You must have a mobile device to purchase tickets online. The game also will be streamed at nfhsnetwork.com/associations/diaa. There is a fee for this service.
