SOUTHINGTON — The Southington girls lacrosse team defeated the Conard Red Wolves 13-8 in a CCC North semifinal matchup at Fontana Field on Tuesday night.
The first half was a back-and-forth affair, with the biggest lead from either team just being one goal. Southington went into the half leading 5-4.
Whatever Southington coach Dave Sargent said to his team at halftime worked, as the Blue Knights opened the second half with five straight goals to stretch their lead to 10-4 within the first 11 minutes.
With the victory, the No. 2-seeded Blue Knights improved to 16-1 and earned a shot at avenging their lone loss of the season. They face top-seeded Simsbury (15-2) in the CCC North championship game on Thursday at Simsbury’s Holden Field.
On Friday, on that very same field, Simsbury broke up Southington’s undefeated season with a 14-8 victory that earned the Trojans the regular-season crown.
The Blue Knights bounced back with Tuesday night’s tournament semifinal victory. In the decisive 5-0 run to open the second half, Southington got goals from Auria Mullins, Taylor Foresi, Makayla Winegar, and two goals from Lilli Doran.
Southington then slowed down the pace in the final 14 minutes with a comfortable lead, although they still scored three more goals.
Doran and Foresi both finished with hat tricks.
“Those are our two senior captains and we know what they are going to give us,” Sargent said of Doran and Foresi.
Sargent also credited balanced scoring to his team’ssuccess this season. He noted the Blue Knights have seven players with 40 or more points.
Defensively, Makenzie LeBarron got the win in net for Southington with seven saves.
Ruby Czajkowski, Leah Williams, and Nicole Gorman scored seven of the eight goals for third-seeded Conard. Czajkowski had three. Williams and Gorman each added two.
The Red Wolves (10-7) will now shift their focus to the state tournament, while Southington takes aim at its rematch with Simsbury.
Sargent sounded excited when finding out about the outcome of Tuesday’s Simsbury-Glastonbury semifinal, which the Trojans won 17-6.
“Simsbury possessed the ball better than us in that matchup and that is something that we will need to do better,” the Southington coach said.