Very little changed with the Fayetteville-Manlius field hockey team following the 2014 season, with just four seniors graduating from a squad that went 9-8-1 and fell to eventual champion Cicero-North Syracuse in the Section III Class A semifinals.
Head coach Cynthia Vulcano hoped that continuity would lead to a conquest when the Hornets hosted its own season-opening tournament last weekend, but it only got half the task accomplished.
F-M met Little Falls in last Friday’s opening round, and never trailed, eventually gaining enough of a cushion to defeat the Mounties by a score of 3-1.
In an otherwise quiet opening half, the Hornets netted the lone goal, and tacked on two more even though Little Falls got on the board when Izzy Battisti put a shot past Caroline Baril.
Christine Carter Huffman netted two of F-M’s three goals, with Sophie Craig earning the other. Molly Quinlan got credit for a pair of assists.
A day later, the final also ended with a 3-1 margin, but the Hornets were on the wrong end of it, falling to Cazenovia, winner of Section III titles each of the last nine years.
The Lakers had routed New Hartford 8-0 in the opening round, and while its roster is small and it lost eight seniors from last year’s team that fell to eventual state champion Whitney Point in the Class C regionals, it still has sophomore Zoe Shephard, whose summer included a gold medal earned at the AAU Junior Olympics in Virginia.
Defenses on both sides ruled in the first half, with neither team able to earn a penalty corner until the midway point. Then, when the chances arose, the shots either went wide or the goalies – Baril for F-M, Maria Groetz for Cazenovia – kicked them away.
The second half initially mirrored the first, with even play and few real chances as Lizzy Shephard took her turn in goal for the Lakers – at least until Zoe Shephard took over.
With 17:24 left, Shephard wove through F-M’s defenders and took a hard shot that Baril could not quite kick away, allowing defender Allie Karmis to poke the rebound home for the game’s first goal. Less than five minutes later, Shephard took Mikaylee Whalen’s pass on a penalty corner and ripped it home.
Trailing 2-0, F-M didn’t go away, cutting the margin to one on Reilly Baker’s rebound goal with 8:43 to play. But it took less than three minutes for Cazenovia to answer, forcing a penalty corner and seeing Shephard’s hard shot deflected into the net by Stalder.
Earlier that day, Little Falls beat New Hartford 4-0 in the consolation game. Meanwhile, F-M takes its shot at Whitney Point on Friday after East Syracuse Minoa opens with Cazenovia on Tuesday and visits Homer on Friday.
