WINDHAM — Marshwood won a game between unbeaten girls’ lacrosse teams Monday night, using a suffocating defense to earn a 13-4 victory against Windham.

Marshwood (6-0) limited Windham (4-1) to 11 shots and more impressively kept the Eagles without a goal for the second half.

Windham scored its final goal with just over four minutes remaining in the first half.

Holly Spencer of Windham opened the scoring and the lead bounced back and forth before Marshwood took control on both ends of the field midway through the first half.

“We kind of got settled down,” said Marshwood Coach Bernie Marvin.

“They’re a very, very fast team and we knew if we could get our defense settled, we’d be OK. We just worked on stopping the ball a little higher. Once we got the ball stopped, we have a pretty good defense and a pretty good goalie. We were able to make them take some long shots and we did a nice job contesting them.”

Added Windham Coach Matt Perkins: “Most of the night we were a pass or two away from a better looking shot. They play really tough defense. They always have three defensemen on the ball. They do a great job setting the wall and we just need to do a better job getting that next pass.”

Midfielders Paige Singer, Reagan Nichols and Hannah Costin bolstered the defense for the Hawks.

“One of the biggest things was they were so good at winning the ground balls,” said Perkins. “It’s something we’ve really done well with this year. We’ve won a lot of ground balls and a lot of draws, but tonight they were the better team at that.”

Costin scored four times on six shots to pace the Hawks’ 21-shot offense.

Nichols and Lucia Albers each added three goals, and Marin Smith chipped in a pair for Marshwood.

“We were just trying to be workmanlike,” said Marvin. “We were looking for good shots, making good passes. We forced a couple early but I think it was just excitement – Windham is a really good team and the girls were excited to play.

“We started to play our game. We’re not really a run-and-gun team, so we just needed to be settled and do the stuff we work on in practice.”

Hannah Skvorak, Mya Manette and Steph Nichols scored for Windham.

Windham goalie Grace Sawyer had a strong showing, turning away nine shots as Marshwood pressured throughout most of the game.

“She did great,” said Perkins. “She’s a tough kid. She came up and faced them, and I thought she did a really nice job.

“They got a lot of shots, and some of them she turned away and we just couldn’t clear the ball, and they scored on second or third chances.”