It was a rousing halftime speech. Spirited wouldn’t be a bad word for it.
Effective might be a better one.
After St. Anne’s-Belfield’s girls lacrosse team entered halftime in a deadlock with St. Catherine’s, head coach Mary Blake let her team know in no uncertain terms that that wasn’t going to work for the Saints.
Her charges responded to the message in a huge way with an incredible eight-goal run to start the second half that eventually turned into a 21-9 victory.
“We weren’t playing with heart, we weren’t playing smart it was just the things as a coach that drive you nuts,” Blake said. “But in the second half it was a totally different game.”
Kate McCullough and Addi Bolin keyed the huge spurt that blew open the 7-7 halftime tie with McCullough accounting for four of the eight goals while Bolin scored three. Lila Satterfield also had a tally during the run. Satterfield finished with a trio of goals on the night.
“I’ve got to give credit to Kate again because when we get down she takes the team on her shoulders,” Blake said.
McCullough and Bolin finished with seven goals each on the day, with Bolin also accounting for four assists. A nifty Bolin pass to McCullough kickstarted the run.
It didn’t hurt that Catherine Towers came up with a number of point blank stops in the cage. The keeper finished with 14 total saves, with nine of them coming after the break.
“(Towers) didn’t have her best first half but her second half was impressive,” Blake said.
Corinna Coffin helped close out St. Catherine’s too, coming up with a couple of key second half draw controls on her way to a pair of goals and an assist.
Aly Doswell led a St. Catherine’s squad that started strong in the first half, with three goals.
The win capped a challenging five-game stretch for the Saints where they faced Western Albemare (a narrow win), Collegiate (a narrow loss) and Episcopal (a narrow loss). Now the Saints have just a pair of games left on the regular season schedule with Trinity Episcopal Friday and Steward next week.
