WESTFIELD – It was a Senior Night that the Westfield High School girls lacrosse team is likely to remember for years to come.
Westfield senior Kara Racicot and sophomore Kiera St. Peter scored four goals apiece to help the Bombers punch their ticket to the state tournament with a 13-9 win over Mount Greylock on Monday night at Worcester State University.
“We all said, ‘it’s our Senior Night, we need to win, we have to pull through and do this for everyone, we have to leave it with a bang, it’s our last home game,’” said Racicot, who helped spearhead Westfield’s game-changing, 7-0 second half run. “Our coach set up a million different [plays] for us to run and we came through.”
Westfield (9-8) trailed early in the second half, 7-6, before reeling off seven straight points to take command of the game.
Racicot tied the game at 7-all with 7:25 showing on the third quarter clock. Westfield would never trail again.
St. Peter scored two goals – one with 5:30 remaining in the quarter and one with 2:22 left in the quarter – to give Westfield a 9-7 lead. The Bombers took a three-goal advantage, 10-7, with 8:58 left in the game. While on the attack, Milana Shuman (three goals, one assist) scooped up a loose ball in the Mount Greylock (5-10) zone and scored.
Less than a minute later (44 seconds to be exact), Shuman bounced one high into the back of the net for an 11-7 lead.
With 5:10 left, Racicot punched in another one. Ellie Adams (three assists) split the middle of the defense, broke into the middle of the field on a fast break and passed to Racicot who finished off the play with a short shot past Mount Greylock goalie Teigan Brady (eight saves).
Shuman delivered the knockout blow, capping off Westfield’s 7-0 run with another score.
“I just feel like we all played together as a team and really worked for it,” Racicot said. “It wasn’t just one of us; we all worked together. It was very beneficial.”
Mount Greylock scored two goals in the final 2:23 but it was too little, too late.
“That was huge and it was all because of the seniors,” Westfield girls lacrosse coach Paul Fenwick said. “All eight started. Some never came off the field. The rest played the majority of the game. It was theirs. If you want it, go get it and obviously they wanted it.”
The first half contrasted sharply with the second half. It was a back-and-forth affair with neither team enjoying more than a two-goal lead. Mount Greylock’s Reese Raymond, who finished the game with five goals, scored four of those goals in the first half. Raymond was held to just one in the second half.
Westfield senior Kayli Bush scored twice, both coming in the first half.
“Our defense held up like crazy,” Racicot said. “They’ve got people cutting left and right but we all stayed together and just worked as a team, backing up cutters, really helping play our man.”
Westfield sophomore goalie Leena Azam finished with eight saves.
“It all started on defense, putting high pressure on the ball,” coach Fenwick said. “They had some good ball players. We got the fast breaks. We got a complete game on both sides of the ball. I think everybody hustled, everybody worked hard. In the times that we struggled, the teamwork broke down. Once we refocused and remembered it’s all about the team, things clicked.”
