WEST SPRINGFIELD — After losing to Frontier Regional School in last year’s WMass Division II Field Hockey championship game, Greenfield High School has been on a mission all season for another shot at the crown.
Consider it done.
After putting together an unbeaten regular season, the top-seeded Green Wave punched its ticket to another championship game by cruising to a 5-0 win over fifth-seeded Southwick-Tolland Regional High School Tuesday night at Clark Field.
Greenfield (16-0-3) put the game away in the second half by scoring four goals to run away from the Rams (9-9-2), who hung tough in the first half and went into the break down only 1-0 despite the Green Wave’s possession dominance. The Green Wave came out quickly after the break and offensive stars Raegan Hickey and Audrey Bresciano combined for perhaps the prettiest goal the Wave has scored all season just 57 seconds into the second half.
Hickey stole the ball near midfield and immediately passed it to Bresciano near the sideline. Bresciano quickly returned the ball to Hickey, who again played it out wide to Bresciano as the two worked the give-and-go to perfection. One more exchange between the two girls gave Bresciano the ball near the corner of the circle and she sent a low pass toward the front of the net, where Hickey was running, and the Green Wave sniper one-timed it past Southwick goalie Sarah Power.
“At halftime, (coach Erin Thayer) told me to banana it, which is to bring it down the right to the end line, which obviously worked better in the second half,” Bresciano said. “Raegan and me just usually have good passing lanes to each other and that play just worked really well from about the 50 up.”
Bresciano was a factor throughout, helping set up three of the Wave’s five goals, and finishing with two assists.
“Audrey really makes a lot happen on offense,” Thayer said. “(With) her speed and her stick skills, she just makes a lot of things happen for our offense. We just have to make sure we are there to finish those chances.”
Greenfield tacked on three more goals in the final 11 minutes to finish off the win. The third goal of the night marked Hickey’s second goal of the game as Green Wave midfielder Katie Haselton worked the ball out of a scrum to the left of Power and pushed it forward to Hickey, who one-timed it into the net with 10 minutes, 11 seconds left. One minute later, Greenfield was again threatening and Southwick was called for a penalty stroke for having a defender behind the goal line. Thayer called on defender Ashley Hubbard to take the stroke. According to Thayer, the team has been working on strokes in practice recently and her decision came down to two finalists. Upon hearing that she was one of them, Thayer said Hubbard went to Pioneer three times in the past week and worked on penalty strokes for hours. That hard work paid off, as Hubbard blasted a shot past Power for a 4-0 lead.
The final goal of the night came with three seconds left when Bresciano passed the ball to Kirsten Ward, who fired it into the net.
The victory moved Greenfield to the finals, where it will get another shot at Frontier after the second-seeded Red Hawks defeated third-seeded South Hadley High School, 1-0, in the other semifinal Tuesday evening. The championship game will take place Friday at West Springfield at a time to be determined. Greenfield senior captain Grace Kennedy said getting another shot at the title is the thing the Wave has worked for all season.
“It feels great, especially senior year, to be undefeated and the No. 1 seed. It’s everything you could ask for,” Kennedy explained. “Our second half was just perfect. It was so much of an improvement and showed all the hard work we have put in this season.”
Kennedy and fellow center midfielder Alyssa Garvin each had huge nights in the middle to prevent the Rams from working the ball upfield. That helped Greenfield dominate from the start and the Wave never allowed Southwick to get a shot on goalie Samantha Smith. Southwick rarely got the ball on the Greenfield side of the field and finished with just one corner without ever having a quality scoring chance.
The Green Wave, meanwhile, finished with 20 shots on the night, including 11 in the first half, although the Wave started slow and managed just one goal in the opening 30 minutes. The only goal of the first half belonged to Amanda Elwell, who benefited from a Bresciano feed. The scoring play started with Bresciano working the ball down the wing before sending a pass toward the front of the net. Kennedy swiped at it and Power made an initial save, but the ball went right to Elwell who left no doubt about it when she slammed it into the empty net.
Power finished with 15 saves in the loss.