BATH

Out of the pre-game huddle at Morse High School on Saturday, Freeport girls lacrosse coach Marcia Wood reminded her team “It all starts on the draw!”

She was surely right, and many of her team’s ensuing goals came directly off the draw control. The Falcons controlled possession throughout the first half of the Class B North tilt with the Shipbuilders and used a decisive eight-goal run to secure their first win of the season, 12-6, over the Shipbuilders at McMann Field.

“This year, it’s switching things up a lot,” Wood said. “You can’t come over the restraining line until the draw’s been possessed — it’s a little bit more strategy to that. I have some really tall girls on the draw. Number 10 Jessie Driscoll is really good at ground balls and she’s really fast. Trying to put them there. That was kind of a killer at our first game at York (15-7 loss). We could not capitalize on a draw control.”

“There’s three or four of us that do draw controls and we switch off,” Freeport junior Taylor Dostie said. “Recently, we’ve been doing drills, we split off from the rest of our team and we work on different things. Last year, we had a girl come and help us, a college player. She showed us different draw controls and how to force it where you want. That definitely helped.”

It was a back-and-forth game early, with Morse (2-1) winning a pair of draws and getting a goal each from Amanda Gagne and Emily Martin to make the score 2-2, but Freeport (1-2) won 10-of- 13 in the frame and dominated the ball. The scoring run started with an Emma Carter free-position finish at 13:21, and just over a minute later, Dostie scooped up a rebound and scored to make it 4-2.

Two more draw-control wins led to goals from Taylor Rinaldi (free position) and Margaret Perrotta (unassisted run-in) and at 6- 2, the game was starting to slip away from Morse.

“The biggest run for them is that they moved the ball quickly and successfully,” Morse co-coach Linda Levesque said. “We’re reloading on defense and a couple breakdowns, they’re a good enough team. Coach (Wood) is very experienced, runs a good, tight ship. Offensively, they probably had more weapons than we did. But still, even in the first half, it was a matter of inches. We got it all the way to the end and didn’t finish.”

“I thought just their tenacity and going after ground balls. They wouldn’t stop until there was four or five of them on a ground ball, over-powering us,” Morse’s Emilie Platteter said. “I think they’re tenacity over-powered us.”

Dostie (team-high four goals) completed her hat trick and scored again at 4:36, and Rinaldi and Perrotta capped the first half scoring to make it 10-2 at the break. Ten of the Falcons’ 14 first-half shots rippled the net.

“I think we really just needed to work the ball around,” Dostie said. “At first, we were kind of forcing the ball and not being too smart, but later on, we started to work stuff and run different things. I think that helped us a lot, just being calm.”

“Just finding our rhythm,” Wood said. “We are still just getting back from vacation, finally getting our team together. We’re still trying to find field space — we’ve only been on a field like three times. We’re just trying to find our rhythm.”

Punch back

As Platteter put it, Morse ‘came out with a new fire’ in the second half and looked like a different team. Four of nine draws went the Shipbuilders’ way and a Paige Daigle goal at 18:47 opened the scoring. A finish from Emma Warner and a second from Martin on a free position made the score 11-5.

“I think we definitely kind of had this urgency that sometimes we lack,” Morse senior Noa Sreden said. “Once we all get into the mentality of ‘We only have 25 minutes left, what’s to lose?’ and even if it requires us to go a little crazy — run past balls and maybe we’re a little sloppy with our sticks. At least the urgency is there. We fire each other up.”

“If the streak is against you, you can’t get down,” Levesque said. “You’ve got to keep plugging away.”

Sreden got on the board herself with 2:41 left to play and Morse matched Freeport on shots (11-11) in the frame. Falcons’ netminder Jordan Randall (11 saves) also kept a few point-blank tries out. On the other end, freshman Abby Sreden blocked seven shots in the second half for the Shipbuilders.

There were plenty of positives to take away for Levesque and co-coach Jess Avery.

“The message is we’re doing the right stuff, we just need to clean it up a little bit,” Levesque said. “We’re getting good energy, we’re playing everybody and they’ve got the right idea with what we want them to do. We need to continue to push each other in practice, push the pace. This was a faster-paced game than the first two games we played.”

Morse will look to rebound on Tuesday at home against Winslow (5 p.m.), while Freeport, with its balanced attacked warmed up after a win, will host Cape Elizabeth today at 4 p.m.

“We do have a great balance between both Taylors (Rinaldi, Dostie), Chloe (Davidson) and some of my new players — Margaret Perrotta had a wonderful game today. That’s kind of what you want. You don’t want a one-show pony,” said Wood.

Freeport 12,
Morse 6

At McMann Field in Bath
Freeport — 10 2 — 12
Morse — 2 4 — 6
Goals — (F) Mikaela Dorsey, Chloe
Davidson, Taylor Dostie 4, Taylor
Rinaldi 2, Margaret Perrotta 2, Catriona Gould, Emma Carter; (Mo) Emily
Martin 2, Amanda Gagne, Paige
Daigle, Emma Warner, Noa Sreden.
Assists — (F) Emma Carter, Taylor
Rinaldi, Catriona Gould 2; (Mo) Karen
Yurek, Amanda Gagne.
Shots — Freeport 25, Morse 18.
Saves — (F) Jordan Randall 11; (Mo)
Abby Sreden 7, Zenaide McCarthy 3.
Draw controls — Freeport 15, Morse
7.
Records — Freeport 1-2, Morse 2-1.
Up next for the Falcons — Today at
home against Cape Elizabeth, 4 p.m.
Up next for the Shipbuilders —
Tuesday at home against Winslow, 5
p.m.

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