TURNERS FALLS — Southwick Tolland Regional High School goalie Sarah Power stymied the Turners Falls High School offense for 90 minutes, sending Thurdsay night’s WMass Division II field hockey quarterfinal game into penalty strokes after a scoreless regulation and overtime.
The senior netminder did not let up during strokes and her play helped the fifth-seeded Rams top the fourth-seeded Indians, 3-1, at the Bourdeau Fields Complex.
Power was almost perfect in penalty strokes, where she went toe-to-toe with Turners Falls goalie Haleigh Greene, who came on in relief of Turners Falls starting goalie Maddie Currier for the shootout. Turners Falls coach Megan Gilbert, who coached her final game due to a conflict with her job, made the decision to go with Greene, who had been better at stopping strokes in practice.
“Honestly, it’s something I’ve been thinking about all week and it was one of the hardest decisions to make as a coach, to pull a senior who has been playing for me for four years, for an eighth-grader, but while Maddie’s overall game play is fantastic and her experience supercedes Haleigh, I’ve seen Haleigh perform better at strokes in practice, so I felt that was a decision I had to make.”
The decision would have worked if the Indians could have gotten a goal in the first round of shooters. Both teams got five shooters during strokes, but the first round was all about the goalies, as Power and Greene both stopped everything that came their way. That sent the game to another round of five shooters, and this time the Rams had some luck. After Power stopped Indian shooter Samantha Kolodziej in the first round, Alyssa Pompi went to the stripe for Southwick and her shot was low into the right side corner. Both goalies then stopped their next shot, and Power made another save on Cassidhe Wozniak in the third round. Caroline Wilcox gave the Rams a 2-0 lead when she scored in the upper-left corner of the goal, leaving the Indians down 2-0 with two shooters remaining.
Alysha Wozniak finally got a ball past Power when she scored for Turners Falls in the fourth round, but Emma Barnard clinched the win for the Rams when her fourth-round shot got through the pads of Greene, giving the Rams the 3-1 lead.
Southwick (9-8-2) came away with the victory after getting outplayed for the final 60 minutes of the game. The Rams played well in the first half and took play to the hosts for the first 30 minutes, outshooting the Indians, 5-1, in the first half. Currier had to stand tall to keep the Rams off the board, and she made a great save five minutes into the game on a chance by Wilcox, and then stymied Pompi with seven minutes to play in the first half. She also got some help from her defense in the first half, when Aly Murphy cleared a ball off the line on a shot by Emily Martin with two minutes left in the first half.
Turners Falls controlled much of the play after halftime and outshot the Rams, 14-1, in the second half and overtime. But the Indians were unable to beat Power, who thwarted a number of opportunities by the hosts, most notably her stops on Indian sniper Cassidhe Wozniak. The sophomore had at least four second-half saves on Wozniak from point-blank range. Turners Falls held Southwick shotless in both 15-minute overtime periods of 7-vs-7, as they dominated the time of possession, but the Indians were unable to generate any great scoring opportunities due to the strong play of the Southwick defense.
Power finished with 15 saves, while Currier made five stops. Turners Falls had 12 corners to just two for Southwick.
Southwick advances to Tuesday night’s semifinals to play top-seeded Greenfield High School at either 5 or 7 p.m. The game will be at West Springfield High School.