Panthers push past Indians to title game
SELINSGROVE — Bloomsburg showed early and often that speed kills in a 5-0 win over Muncy in the District 4 Class 2A field hockey semifinals.
With the win, the Panthers (13-5-2) play Line Mountain in the championship on Thursday. They also secured a spot in the state playoffs.
“I knew that our speed would be a key for us,” Bloomsburg coach Chuck Baker said. “Maggie Mylin is so fast. Andi Gutshall, they both were on the silver medal [400] relay team from last year, so you know they have speed. Boy, they just picked up every loose ball there was.”
Mylin and Gutshall, along with Kassie Bond, Gracie Brosious, Lillian Fogelsanger and Justina Nguyen, kept all the pressure on the Indians. Maneuvering past Muncy defenders at will, the Panthers seemingly just couldn’t finish drives at first.
An Indians penalty corner just six minutes in gave Bloomsburg the wake-up call it needed. The Panthers quickly flipped the field, and Gutshall finished the possession by getting a shot past Alaina Brelsford for the game’s first goal. Brelsford made a diving stop on the Panthers' initial shot, but couldn’t corral the ball before Gutshall’s final touch.
The Panthers had great cross passes all evening, but saw a great number of them go off target when girls swung hard rather than tap passes toward an empty backstop.
The majority of those mishaps occurred on the Panthers’ 13 penalty corners — 11 awarded after halftime. That’s an area Baker wants to improve on as the team advances.
“I would just like to tighten up our corners a little more so we can score a little bit more on them,” Baker said. “We scored on a couple, but we really need to finish it up.”
The one time Bloomsburg got it right was when Gutshall, on another breakaway, found an open Alayna Lovelace on a great cross pass. Lovelace finished the job for a 2-0 lead.
The Panthers doubled their lead by half, thanks to a pair of goals by freshman Fogelsanger. Her first came as the Panthers were playing down a player with Samantha Sabo penalized for two minutes on a 5-yard violation.
The large lead didn’t have the Panthers playing any more lightly.
“With a 4-0 lead, I stressed that we can’t be complacent at any time because these teams can jump up and score quick,” Baker said. “We just kept the pressure on. We didn’t finish like we could, some near misses, but we just kept shoving it down their throat.”
Not only did the Panthers rack up a lot of corners, they also took another 10 shots in the final 30 minutes to finish with 18 overall.
Muncy, meanwhile, was held to two shots and was held shotless in the second half until the 7:30 mark of the fourth quarter. The Indians also had three corners.
Bond accounted for the Panthers’ last goal in the game’s last five minutes with Brosious collecting her third assist of the contest.
When the final horn sounded, Baker lifted his arms in both relief and celebration.
“This is the most nerve-wracking because a win puts you in the state tournament,” Baker said. “Of course, everybody wants a district title, but it’s gravy because you’re already one of the final 16. That was our goal from the beginning of the season.”
Mission accomplished, even if it was unexpected by that outside of the team.
Baker credits the team’s brutal schedule featuring the likes of Wyoming Valley West, Wyoming Area, Crestwood, Lewisburg and Lehighton for having the team ready to play this postseason.
“I think we are [finding our stride]. We’re playing very well,” Baker said. “We took our beatings during the regular season — we took a couple of bad losses, and we took a couple of tough losses. Our difficult schedule against the Wyoming Valley Conference and in our league made us playoff-ready.
“... We’re back here and a lot of people didn’t think we would be,” Baker said. “We lost seven seniors last year and we were told on a videotape from last year’s game that when this time of year came back, it wouldn’t be us. We’re going to try and win it again.”
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