No. 1 McDonogh girls lacrosse proves playoff ready with 10-8 win over No. 4 St. Paul’s

McDonogh midfielder Kate Levy said her top-ranked girls lacrosse team needed a challenge to sharpen its focus heading into the Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland A Conference playoffs.

In Monday’s regular-season finale, host No. 4 St. Paul’s gave the Eagles just that, taking an early two-goal lead and staying within striking distance throughout.

In the end, however, McDonogh’s experience on both sides of the ball was simply too much for the young Gators in a 10-8 win against a team it has met in the conference final three of the past four seasons. Levy, a senior committed to North Carolina, finished with four goals, an assist, eight draw controls, and three caused turnovers as the Eagles defeated their rival for the third straight time.

“There’s a lot of history between these two teams. Whenever you play them you know you’re going to have to get up for it and it’s going to be a physical battle no matter the score,” Levy said. “I think we needed this challenge. This team needs to know they have the fight in them to win any game, no matter the circumstance or what’s happening.”

Those circumstances became more dire with 6:50 left in the third quarter when All-Metro midfielder-attacker Remi Schaller, a Michigan commit, fell to the turf while trying to plant with her left leg. She was helped off the field and did not return.

“We’re not going to make any judgments before we know for sure what it is, but that’s definitely deflating for our team,” McDonogh coach Megan Nicotra said. “The whole team has to step up.”

McDonogh (15-1, 13-0), the nation’s consensus No. 2 team, now advances to the upcoming IAAM A Conference tournament, where the defending champion already had wrapped up the No. 1 seed. The Eagles will begin play against the winner of Wednesday’s game between the league’s No. 8 and 9 seeds.

The semifinals are set for May 8 with the final scheduled for Mat 10 at 7 p.m. at USA Lacrosse in Sparks.

Before any of that, the Eagles first had to survive a challenge from upset-minded St. Paul’s (13-5, 10-3), which had rebounded nicely after shaking off a three-game midseason losing streak.

Paced by three goals by junior midfielder Caroline Hoskins, a Florida commit, St. Paul’s jumped out to an early 2-0 lead but then allowed five straight goals as the Eagles wrestled away control. Five Eagles — Levy, Ayiana Rippin, Amanda Lawson, Sophia Trahan and Schaller — scored during the stretch, as McDonogh’s defense held St. Paul’s scoreless for 15:11.

“Our defense has been great so far this season, but this game we really stepped it up as a team,” Eagles junior defender Mckenzie Brown, a Northwestern commit, said. “I’m really proud of how we played.”

“We focused all week on preparing for their offense,” Nicotra said. “We know they have multiple threats, and we really focused on holding our one-vs.-one’s long enough to let our help get there. I think this was the first game that they’ve really put it together and played as a complete unit.”

McDonogh led, 9-5, until early in the fourth quarter when the Gators battled back with consecutive goals by Riley Vasile and Cameron Vasile. After the teams traded goals, however, McDonogh won the following draw and slowed its offense to a crawl, holding the ball for more than four minutes to end the game.

St. Paul’s coach Mary Gagnon said her offense — which at times plays four freshmen — needs to take better advantage of its opportunities to make a playoff run.

“We’re really young offensively, and I think that was the difference in the game,” she said. “We have no seniors on attack. They played well, but at times they played not as poised as you need to be. The difference was the poise that McDonogh showed and the poise that we need to understand. You can see moments of it … but at some points we didn’t make good decisions, became really individualistic. We have talent; it’s there. We’ve just got to trust it and run the offense.”

Goals: M — Levy 4, Lawson 2, Trahan 2, Schaller, Rippin; SP — Hoskins 3, O’Day, Porter, R. Vasile, C. Vasile, Munsell.

Assists: M — Levy; SP — O’Day.

Saves: M — O’Donovan 3; SP — Radabaugh 4.

Half: 7-4, M