In front of a small, yet knowledgeable, Sunday morning crowd, the women’s lacrosse teams began to warm up. Lancaster’s warm up consisted mainly of shooting drills, with York choosing to focus on passing. Once the fixture had begun, Lancaster’s shooting practice paid dividends, with Lancaster midfielder Mia Scarbrough opening the scoring. Maya Roberts of Lancaster, who would go on to have a brilliant game, doubled Lancaster’s lead early in the first quarter.
Slightly against the run of the play, York managed to claw back a point when attacker Lara Dalton beat three players and pushed the ball into the back of the net. The accuracy of each pass was an astonishing part of this fixture, with the players catching 40 yard passes with ease. This made for an extremely fast-paced, aggressive fixture, which was constantly up and down the field.
When play resumed after a break between quarters, the intensity of play continued, with York levelling the scores before taking a swift lead. The two sides retreated to the sidelines for half time with York leading 5-3, showcasing a dominant end to the second quarter spearheaded by Lara Dalton.
York continued to assert their dominance deep into the third quarter, with Katie Hewetson scoring a well worked team goal to extend the lead to 7-3. This lead would extend by two more points before Lancaster could respond, by this point the game was already gone. Although York’s offence outclassed Lancaster’s, it was in the defence that York particularly looked superior, with goal keeper Kathryn Halstead making some crucial stops to prevent Lancaster’s fight back.
It took a moment of individual brilliance, turning out to be undoubtedly the goal of the match, to restore Lancaster’s confidence in front of the net, with centre Mathilde Birch intercepting the ball at the halfway line, beating a number of players, all before sliding the ball into the back of the net. This moment inspired a slight back from Lancaster, with Maya Roberts and Gabbie Freeman scoring goals in quick succession to capitalise on York’s lacklustre 4th quarter performance, moving the scores to 9-7.
In the end, this late fight back proved futile, York capitalised on late defensive errors by Lancaster to close out the game at 12-8. One touching sentiment was the presence of handshakes between the two sides at full time, a gesture of amiability and respect between the two sides in what was an intense, hard fought fixture.