By Chris Goldberg
Phillylacrosse.com, Posted 5/25/10
Allie Martin pumped in five goals and Annie Woehling made 11 saves – including several key stops in the last 10 minutes – as Radnor scored the game’s final four goals and earned a 12-9 triumph over Unionville tonight in a District 1 girls’ lacrosse semifinal at West Chester East.
The victory gave the top-seeded Red Raiders (21-1) a berth in the championship game Thursday (at Henderson, 6 p.m.) against Springfield-Delco, a 19-14 winner over Great Valley in the other semifinal game at East. Radnor, which fell to Springfield-Delco in last year’s district title game, shared the Central League crown with the Cougars as well as Strath Haven this year.
Fifth-seeded Unionville (19-3) will face Ches-Mont League rival Great Valley in the third-place game at Henderson at 4 p.m. Great Valley beat out the Indians for the Ches-Mont crown this year. All four teams have advanced to the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association (PIAA) tournament.
The Indians, though, had taken a 9-8 lead when Lindsey Smith (three goals) scored with 13:22 to play to cap a 3-0 run. But Martin tied it three minutes later and then put her team ahead for good a minute later. Kristen Norden soon scored on a free position and Ellie Kraus iced it in the final seconds.
Unionville had many chances to rally in the last 10 minutes, but Woehling, a junior, was brilliant, and Radnor won most of the draws in the final minutes.
“These are my favorite kind of games, because I get to be that last defender,” said Woehling. “If it gets through everybody, I get to show people what I can do. The excitement is ridiculous and I just love it.”
Woehling admitted she is happy to face Springfield-Delco in the title game. Last year the Cougars dealt Radnor its only loss of the year in the District 1 finals. This year in the regular season the Red Raiders rallied for an 8-7 triumph over Springfield.
“I’m going to say that we’re really excited to have a second chance at the district title with Springfield and I think we’ll come our with this refuse-to-lose attitude that we get,” she said. “It’s going to be a great game.”
Erin Linthicum added two goals and one assist for the Indians and Lizzy Carney had a goal and an assist while Melissa Lloyd made nine saves in goal.
“I’m a little frustrated,” said Unionville coach Wendy Landry. “I told the girls I thought we beat ourselves. We weren’t shooting smart and we didn’t make the adjustments on what we needed to do. Their goalie is great and we ended up making her look really great because we didn’t adjust on our shots.
“We had chances and we did not capitalize. When you’re playing a team like Radnor, if you’re going to go in, you have to make it count. And then not getting the draw was really hurting us.”
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