Girls’ Lacrosse: Corona del Mar bows out

LOS ALAMITOS — A goal for any Orange County high school girls’ lacrosse team is to capture the U.S. Lacrosse Southern Section South Division championship.

But improvement surely is a goal as well, and to that end, the Corona del Mar High girls’ lacrosse team ended its season in remarkable fashion Thursday night.

Nearly two months after their worst game of the season, a 15-1 nonleague setback at Los Alamitos, they returned to the scene of the crime and played perhaps their best game of the season.

And, though it was the No. 3-seeded host Griffins who came away with an 11-9 victory in the South Division quarterfinals, it was the No. 6-seeded Sea Kings who were able to walk off satisfied with the end of that season.

“Honestly, we did what we wanted to do,” said CdM senior co-captain Mason Bendetti, who scored a team-high four goals. “Even though we didn’t come out with a win, we showed them what we were about, and we gave them a run for their money. We played as a team and I think we played our hearts out.”

Los Alamitos, the six-time defending South Division champion, moves on to play No. 2-seeded Foothill in Saturday’s 2 p.m. semifinal at Mission Viejo High. Top-seeded Mater Dei will play No. 4 Beckman in the first semifinal, at noon.

But CdM (11-7) came close to dethroning the Griffins (12-6).

Corona del Mar controlled the action at the beginning. The Sea Kings controlled five of the first six draws of the game and took a 2-1 lead on goals from junior Kennedy McGuinness and Bendetti (assisted by McGuinness). The score was tied, 2-2, when Los Alamitos defensive midfielder Dom Loney went down with a leg injury with 12:40 remaining in the first half.

“Dom’s one of our senior captains, a huge leader on the field, and she’s a lefty,” Los Al Coach Emily Mukai said. “She’s hard to replace. She’s one of those players that a lot of our plays are based around.”

Los Al, undeterred, scored five consecutive goals to take a 7-2 advantage. Sophia Schade (five goals for the game) and Natalie Martinez (four) combined for three goals in the run, and it looked like the Griffins had seized control. They led, 7-3, at halftime, after CdM junior Delaney Carroll trimmed the deficit by one.

But CdM scored the first four goals of the second half. First it was sophomore Jensen Coop controlling the draw before running in to score, then Bendetti dodging several defenders to stick it in. Carroll then found junior Paige Nelson for a goal, then Nelson fed Bendetti to tie the score, 7-7, with 16:58 remaining in the game.

“It was kind of cool to see Los Al freak out a little bit,” Bendetti said. “They got aggressive, and they got so rude. We’ve never seen them get so flustered, because they were expecting us to be another 15-1 game. We came out and we totally just gave them a run for their money. They were shocked, and you could just tell by the way they were playing and what they were saying to us.”

Mukai said her team was a bit flustered, but more due to Loney’s injury and the refereeing that allowed both teams to play a physical game. But her team responded.

Martinez scored on back-to-back free position shots to give Los Alamitos a 9-7 advantage. A Los Al player was then issued a yellow card, but CdM failed to score with the player advantage as two good chances both went just wide of the cage. Almost immediately, the Griffins’ Schade scored on the other end to increase the lead.

Schade’s fifth goal gave Los Alamitos an 11-7 lead with 3:51 remaining. Bendetti scored, then fed Nelson for a quick goal in front with 52 seconds left. But Los Alamitos’ Emily Hansen controlled the ensuing draw, and the Griffins were able to run out the clock.

Los Alamitos junior goalkeeper Campbell Poe, who Mukai inserted early in the second half, made two big saves as well as a key interception.

CdM Coach Aly Simons, whose team failed to return to the semifinals, still was very proud of her players.

“It was a great game because it felt like things came full circle in a way,” she said,. “We really grew into a more mature team late in the season.”

Coop led CdM with six draw controls, Kennedy Mulvaney had four caused turnovers and fellow sophomore Hailey Neumann added three. McGuinness led CdM with four ground balls, and freshman goalie Ashley Olson made three saves.

“We had nothing to lose in that game,” said Nelson, who had two goals and an assist. “We knew that if we beat Los Al, we were going to keep going. This was the game, and we could have beat them. It was so close. We really worked as hard as we could there. If you think about our last game against them, it was 15-1, but the growth that we’ve had as a team is crazy.”

Tears were plentiful on the CdM players’ faces after the game, but they said it wasn’t because of the result but because the season was over.

“We love each other,” Bendetti said. “This team is so fun. It just sucks, leaving them. We’re so close, and we just always want to be together.”

Simons said the senior class, led by co-captains Bendetti, Megan Rieden and Emily Schwartz, will be missed dearly.

Nelson, a junior who will be a returning team leader next season, agreed with that sentiment.

“As juniors, we have so much to say about our seniors,” she said. “We love them and we don’t know what we’d do without them. They’re the people that have driven our team, and they’re the reason for our growth this season.”