NEW LONDON, Conn. –
With the clock winding down to zero,
Rileigh Leary (Holden, MA) threw the ball to the ground in elation and joined her teammates in a dog pile on the field. The celebration was the culmination of a gritty game, stellar play, and a whole season of excellence. It has been a year of firsts for the Bears; they beat Springfield and Babson for the first time in program history and now add to that list of firsts by making the NEWMAC title game. The Pride battled for the full 60 but the Bears again showed the key postseason ability to survive and advance.
For Springfield, they finish the year with a strong 11-7 record. Coast Guard's appearance in the title game this year will mark the first time in NEWMAC history that the game was not some combination of MIT, Babson, and Springfield.
At the start of the action, Coast Guard went up 2-0 in the first five minutes before a late first quarter run of three unanswered sent the game into the second with the Pride leading by a score of 3-2. Senior captain and the nation's leader in points per game
Abby McAllister (Pleasantville, NY) had a hand in both scores with a man-up goal followed by an assist to fellow senior
Isabella Judge (Buffalo, NY).
The second quarter was the
Joely Schaumloffel (Remsenburg, NY) show. The standout freshman out-scored the Springfield team 4-2 in the second to give the Bears a 6-5 halftime lead. Two of Schaumloffel's goals were again assisted by McAllister. The third saw McAllister score twice, Schaumloffel once, and the Bears extend their lead to 9-7. For Springfield,
Lily Johnson scored twice to keep her squad in the fight. Across the second and third, Coast Guard forced 10 turnovers.
In the fourth,
Riley Leary scored two unassisted goals within a minute of each other to extend the Coast Guard lead to 11-7. Springfield answered with a two up goal with just over seven minutes remaining. Trailing by three after the goal, Springfield had a man up opportunity but Coast Guard freshman
Taylor Thorne (Edgewater, MD) won the draw. Off the draw,
Joely Schaumloffel delivered the dagger in style with a nifty move to shed her defender and find herself open for the man-down goal. The score also marked 50 on the season for the stud first year and Rookie of the Year candidate. Thorne winning that draw was common this evening, with the freshman grabbing seven DCs and taking every draw for CGA. Sophomore
Ella Campbell (Foxborough, MA) came away with six DCs as well. As a team, Coast Guard was excellent on the draw, winning 15 of 22 against a Springfield team that came in as one of the best in the conference in the circle.
The final six plus were crunch time, with back and forth defensive play. In that time, the teams combined for eight turnovers, three fouls, three green cards, and no scores. With just over a minute to go in the action,
Cate Yurko (Oakton, VA) both caused a Pride turnover and got the ground ball to give the Bears the ability to simply run out the clock and run their way into the NEWMAC Championship!
As a defense, Coast Guard caused 16 turnovers, with senior
Lauren Henry (Monroe, CT) leading the way with four.
Ella Campbell and
Rowan Walsh (Hampstead, MD) combined for four with two each and contributed in a big way to the Springfield offense not reaching the double-digit mark. Campbell and Walsh each came away with two ground balls as well with
Cate Yurko leading the squad with three.
The Bears will travel up to Cambridge, Massachusetts on Saturday for a noon battle vs top seeded MIT. MIT advanced to the finals with a dominating win over Babson College earlier today. Earlier this season, Coast Guard fell to MIT by a final score of 14-7. In what has been a true year of firsts for the Bears, they have the opportunity to notch two off their list on Saturday: first ever win over MIT and first ever NEWMAC title.
