Outmatched by Magicians, 19-6

Published June 7, 2019

By BEN PAINCHAUD

MARBLEHEAD—For the second year in a row, the Melrose High girl’s lacrosse team bowed out to a tall and skilled Marblehead team in the first round of the Division I North playoffs, losing 19-6 at Marblehead High on Tuesday night.

Interestingly enough, last year’s final score was eerily similar, with Melrose scoring one less goal in a 19-5 defeat.

By the end of the first half, Marblehead held a commanding 9-2 lead, and a barrage of goals by the Magicians early in the second half doomed Melrose, which was hardly in its offensive zone at all in the second half.

“I can’t thank my seniors enough,” said Melrose head coach Matt Galusi after the game. “My senior captains…our senior leadership, especially with our captains, you know they’re gonna be missed…you hate to see a kid’s season end anytime, and to end in a fashion like this…it’s tough.”

THE MELROSE High girl’s lacrosse Div. 1 North playoff run ended on Tuesday against a tough Marblehead team. (Donna Larsson photo)

With two seconds to spare in the first half, Marblehead received a free position opportunity following a Melrose infraction. Marblehead was gifted a wide-open run at the net right before halftime, but Melrose goalie Linnea Kelley blocked the shot attempt as time expired, preventing the first half from ending on a dreary note. When it came time to play the next 25 minutes, however, the Lady Raiders couldn’t carry over that small bit of momentum.

Marblehead stormed out of the gate in the second half even harder than it did in the first. The Magicians controlled the opening draw of the second half and converted a quick-hitter, seemingly catching Melrose off-guard. Marblehead tacked on three more unanswered goals within a matter of minutes before Lily Cunningham finally broke Melrose’s spell, finding Emma Randolph in transition for a strike.

Galusi indicated that his team simply had no answer for the size and talent of Marblehead. “Their height gave them such an advantage on the draw circle and just, you know, other spots,” said Galusi, “but again, it all goes back to just their talent level. Their talent level is through the roof.”

The Lady Raiders didn’t even have a true offensive possession until about the 14:30 mark in the second. Lily Cunningham ripped a low, bouncing shot past Marblehead for a goal between then and the 8:40 mark, at which point Galusi called timeout with his team down 18-4. Melrose limited Marblehead to just one goal after that point while adding two of its own. With less than three minutes to go, the Magicians slowly worked the ball around to chew up the clock, further driving the dagger into the hopes of Melrose, who could do nothing but ball-watch for a while until eventually forcing a turnover, by which point it was obviously too little too late.

In the first half, Ava Palumbo cashed in on a free position opportunity to put Melrose on the board first. The Magicians then ripped off three unanswered before Emma Randolph disrupted their momentum after corralling a pass, spinning, and firing in a shot to make it 3-2. That was the closest the Lady Raiders would get, though, as Marblehead piled on six unanswered to make it 9-2 at half.

It seemed that the Magicians were simply the more aggressive team defensively in the first half, and it showed, as Melrose lost possession time and again with sloppy passes and ball-handling. At times, Marblehead sent double-teams to Melrose ball-carriers on the perimeter, which seemingly prevented the Lady Raiders from establishing its set offense. It didn’t help that Marblehead’s goalie came up with at least two saves on free position opportunities for Melrose.

“We’d get down a couple times, and I thought we had a good possession, and then a sloppy pass or a sloppy deflection,” said Galusi. “It’s—I can’t pinpoint it, because we move the ball, and we scored some goals, and we had some transition, but I think this is the kind of team where we…we took our foot off the pedal for a second and kind of let up a little, and they were on top of us so fast with that check.”

With the loss, the 2019 season drew to a close for Melrose. The Lady Raiders finished the year with a 7-10 overall record, per the MIAA.

Ben Painchaud can be reached at bpainchaud@umass.edu. Follow him on Twitter @Ben_Painchaud.