Hereford's field hockey players and coaches don’t want to dwell on the past, but none could forget what happened last year. The Bulls suffered a rare loss to Towson.
With that in mind, Hereford controlled play for much of the game and posted a 1-0 victory over the visiting Generals on Wednesday. Junior attacker Rachel Karwacki scored on a feed from Emma Reider.
The Bulls (10-1-1) were ready for Towson (7-3).
“We just wanted to come in and play our hardest,” Karwacki said. “And we did. We didn’t have any let down.”
Hereford held a huge advantage in shots (21-1) and penalty corners (8-1).
Fortunately for the Generals and first-year coach Sam Merrick, goalie Jamesy Wood’s skills were on display. The senior made a season-high 15 saves.
“She was phenomenal today,” Merrick said. “She really stepped up. At the beginning of the season, she was not our starting goalie. We have three games left in the regular season, but she was really fired up for Hereford.”
The Bulls were doing everything right in the first half except getting the ball past Wood.
Merrick said the defense of Savanah Cockerille, Christy Nymick and Rachel May played one their best games of the season to aid Wood.
Nymick and May blocked shots in the first half.
“They had a lot of shots and scoring opportunities,” Merrick said. “But we played solid defense to hold them down. It was the most defense we had to play in a game this season, and we went in with that mentality.”
Woods made three consecutive stops in the middle of the first half, including kick saves on attempts from Dana Meehling and Haley Jolly.
Hereford converted on its ninth shot in the second half.
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With 5:06 remaining, Karwacki took a feed from Reider about half way in the 16-yard circle and beat Wood with a blistering shot to the right corner of the cage.
“In the second half, we started to put more pressure on them,” said Hereford first-year coach Caitlin MacKenzie, who expects to play Dulaney in the county championship game Oct. 16 at Lansdowne High. “It just took us a while. I told them during a timeout (12:20 left), ‘You are going to run out of time if you don’t put the ball in the cage.'”
