Madison Girls Lax Falls To West Essex

In an extremely tight, well-played game, the difference was simple: the Madison girls lacrosse team scored two goals in the second half; West Essex's Sloane Serpe scored three.

Serpe scored five goals in total, and the Knights spoiled Madison's Senior Day by picking up a 10-8 victory on a dreary, chilly Wednesday afternoon at Madison High School.

Alli Helwig scored four goals for the Dodgers (9-8), who lost for the seventh time this season by three goals or less. Seniors Evan Foulsham and Kathleen Matthews each scored twice.

"We played well, we did a good job today," said Madison coach Carole Rawding. "Unfortunately some of our shots we weren't able to finish, and the game turned on that."

Madison led at halftime, 6-5, after they held West Essex to just one goal over the final 17 minutes of the first half.

But the Knights came out of the gate with three straight goals to take an 8-6 lead with 18:44 to go. Serpe scored the first two, while Kayleigh Thies added the third.

Helwig cut the deficit to 8-7 with 16:14 to play off a feed from Ali Foulsham, but it took just nine seconds for Serpe to take the ensuing draw ball, run through the Madison defense and fire her fifth goal of the game past Dodger goalie Shannon Sweeney (8 saves).

"Sloane has good fotwork, she's a senior leader, she's been a leader on that team for years," Rawding said. "She knows how to work in isolation. We did a better job on her later in the game, our strategy worked out a bit better. I wish we had changed our strategy sooner."

The Knights would not score again after Alexis Miller's goal with 14:58 to play made it 10-7, but West Essex's lead held up behind goalie Jennifer Weissbach (13 saves) and a stout defense.

After Matthews scored to make it 10-8 with 11:54 to play, Madison appeared primed for a comeback. But time seemed to fly off the clock, and the Dodgers were unable to beat Weissbach and get the lead down to one.

"We had control of the ball and some opportunities on net in the last 10 minutes or so," Rawding said. "But their goalie made the stops. Against a good team like that, you have to take those chances when you get them."

A check from Jackie Fusco with about 4:20 left returned possession to the Knights. West Essex managed to kill the clock for two minutes, and after an immediate Madison turnover, they held on for another minute. The Dodgers rushed up field with under 30 seconds left, getting Chelsea Davies an excellent look, but her low shot was saved by Weissbach and time ran out.

Prior to the final regularly-scheduled home game this season, Madison honored its talented senior class - Matthews, the Foulsham twins, Avery Koep, Davies, Rachel Misko and Lexi Greene and  - all of whom have made immense contributions to the team over the past few years, the first four on offense, the latter three primarily on defense.

But it was the junior, Helwig, that kept Madison afloat in the first half. Despite being hobbled with an ankle injury recently, she was well enough to score a hat trick in the first half as the Dodgers rebounded from an early 4-1 deficit.

She tied the game on two occassions - a free position goal with 11:25 left in the first to make it 4-4, and a wicked, top-shelf shot eight minutes later tying the game at 5-5. Evan Foulsham put Madison ahead 13 seconds later, but it would be Madison's last lead of the day.

"This was such an important win for us," said West Essex coach Jill Cosse. "It was an even game all the way through, they have great talent, a great coaching staff. When two teams duel like this at this level, it means a lot to come out on top."

NEXT UP
The Dodgers originally had their regular season finale, an NJAC  game with Boonton, scheduled for Thursday, but that game has been postponed to a date and time to be announced.

Instead, Madison's next game will be its NJSIAA Tournament opener.

Madison was awarded the No. 3 seed in North Jersey, Group I, and the Dodgers will open the tournament at home against No. 14 seed Newark Academy. The game is currently scheduled for Saturday at 10 a.m. at FDU-Florham, though Rawding said the school was trying to move the game to Friday afternoon at Madison High School.

The winner of the Madison-Newark Academy game will take on the winner of Saturday's Pequannock-Kinnelon game in the sectional quarterfinals on May 18. Madison would host that game if it advances.

BOX SCORE
West Essex   5  5  -  10
Madison         6  2  -   8

GOALS
WE- Sloane Serpe 5, #16 2, #10 1, Jackie Fusco 1, #14 1
MAD- Alli Helwig 4, Evan Foulsham 2, Kathleen Matthews 2

ASSISTS
WE- #10 1, Sloane Serpe 1
MAD- Evan Foulsham 1, Alli Helwig 1, Kathleen Matthews 1, Ali Foulsham 1, Chelsea Davies 1

SHOTS ON GOAL
West Essex    10    8  -  18
Madison          11  10  -  21

SAVES
WE- Jennifer Weissbach 13
MAD- Shannon Sweeney 8