HARVARD — Bromfield came into Monday afternoon’s Mid Wach B tilt with neighboring Littleton unbeaten in its first 16 games, but the Tigers refused to let the Trojans escape with win number 17.
The Tigers used a four-goal performance by Amanda Crory to edge Bromfield 11-10.
The Trojans fell behind by four goals late in the second half. sophomore Soph Turchetta (9 goals, 1 assist) tallied three-consecutive goals to bring Bromfield within one, but the Littleton offense gained possession and milked the clock.
“Credit to Littleton, they’re a very good team,” Bromfield head coach Dave Planchet said. “They killed us on the draw control today. We will learn to fight through it in the playoffs. I told the girls ‘good teams learn from these things, and they come out on the other end stronger.’ I’d rather have that happen now and come out stronger during our playoff run. We have never been down that far this year — I am proud of them for clawing back.”
Twenty-four seconds into the game, Jackie Planchet (3 goals, 3 assists) scooped up the ball in the faceoff circle and raced into the 8-meter arc and tucked the ball under the stick of the Littleton goalie — that would be the only lead the Trojans would hold in the match.
The Tigers cobbled together a 3-0 run behind goals from Alana Maher, Bridget Schofield and Crory. Bromfield fought back to tie the game at three with a couple of quick strikes by Turchetta.
Jackie Planchet picked up an assist in the sequence with a feed from behind the cage. Turchetta gathered the ball and tucked it inside the right post from the floating hash to tie the game at 3-3 with 17:50 remaining in the half. Littleton regained the lead on a free position goal by Hayley Anderson from the center hash. Bromfield equalized again at 4-4 on a goal by Jackie Planchet.
Jackie Planchet cradled around the cage, drew contact from a pair of Littleton defenders and flicked the ball past the Littleton keeper with 12:48 remaining in the half. The Tigers edged Bromfield, 3-2, in the final 10 minutes of the opening frame to take a 7-6 lead into half time.
Littleton controlled the draw in the second half, and it led to some early goals.
Bromfield showed some difficulty in controlling loose balls, and the Tigers made it pay. Abby Whitcomb scored 39 seconds in the half as she bulldozed her way in front of the crease to beat Trojan goalie Julia Hoggins. A minute later, Kelsey Doran padded the Littleton lead with a bounce shot that kissed the underbelly of the cross bar and plopped on the line to make it 9-6.
“Today was a good test for our resiliency,” he said. “You cannot expect to go down by that much and come back late in the game. Against good team, you have to do the little things right — and we just didn’t. Tip your hat to Littleton, they won ground balls and the draws.”
