Miller Girls Lax Ousted from Counties

It was a tale of two halves for the Miller girls lacrosse team on Saturday afternoon, as the locals dropped their third straight game at home in the quarterfinal round of the Essex County Tournament, 12-8, against the Caldwell Chiefs.

After taking a 6-3 lead with 21:44 left to play, behind a penalty shot from Emily Butcher, the Millers surrendered nine of the game’s final 11 goals, allowing the Caldwell comeback victory. Caldwell’s Alana Dederick, Annie Mergner and Katie Naspo combined for seven scores during that stretch to spark the comeback.

Following Butcher’s score, both Dederick and Tierney Conlon scored in less than two minutes to cut Millburn’s lead to one. Millburn won the ensuing draw and Nicole Schiller marched right down the field for a score, putting the Millers up 7-5, 10 seconds later.

With 12:58 left in the game, Amanda Jedele caught a pass near the crease, fought through Millburn’s defense and snuck one home. Thirty one seconds later, Mergner converted a groundball into a goal to tie the game. Millburn just couldn’t stop Caldwell’s momentum from there.

Right after a Caldwell groundball off of a Millburn turnover on a penalty, Dederick took a pass in transition and beat Millburn’s second half keeper one-on-one to give the Chiefs the lead for good with 11:08 left. On a penalty play, Caldwell’s Emily Banazynski found Naspo on the left side of the net, and she finished easily from about two yards out.

Later on, Millburn’s Janie Penney barreled down the field after grabbing a groundball and brought the Millers within one with 6:17 left to play, but Millburn did not score again. Meanwhile, Caldwell tacked on three more in the next four minutes to put the game out of reach.

The Chiefs jumped out to an early 3-1 lead behind two scores from Mergner and one from Dederick. Schiller scored Millburn’s only goal in the first 6:39 of play. But from there, Millburn’s defense held the Chiefs scoreless for the final 18:21 of the opening half and for nearly the first five minutes of the second half.

During that stretch, Millburn amassed a 6-3 lead, scoring five unanswered goals. Schiller scored the next two goals to tie the game, and with 9:22 left in the opening half Penney found Meghan lacy in front of the net on transition for an easy score, giving Millburn its first lead. Hallie Pickard weaved in and out of traffic in front of the net and scored with 3:53 left in the first half, giving Millburn a 5-3 halftime lead.

In the first half, Millburn did a great job of exploiting Caldwell’s transition defense, constantly beating the Chiefs down the field. Defensively, after Millburn gave up the initial three goals, Millburn allowed just four more shot attempts in the opening half.

After Millburn took a 6-3 lead, things just fell apart for the home team. The Chiefs won the groundball battle from that point, 15-7, they out-shot the Millers 17-5 and won seven of the final 12 draws. The eight goals scored for Millburn, was a season low.

Caldwell, which improved to 7-2, was led by Mergner’s four goal and two assist performance and also got four scores from Dederick. Conlon led all players with three assists. Millburn’s Schiller led the way with four goals.

After beginning the season 4-1, Millburn has dropped its last three games, all at home against teams which are a combined 19-8. They are now 4-4 and play again at home against Westfield on Tuesday.

Millburn head coach Penny Kaye declined to comment after the loss.