What ultimately defined the 2016 season for the Liverpool field hockey team was that, even if it struggled everywhere else, the Warriors saved its best work for those games against its neighbors from Cicero-North Syracuse.
And none of those games mattered more than Thursday’s Section III Class A opening-round playoff game at Bragman Stadium. Despite the no. 5 seed and the road designation, the Warriors rode a superb defense and a clutch goal in overtime by Brianna Socker to a 1-0 victory over the Northstars.
The rewards were twofold. Liverpool not only got to advance to face top-seeded Baldwinsville (15-1) in Tuesday night’s sectional semifinal at Rome Free Academy Stadium, it also secured local bragging rights, having gone 2-0-1 against C-NS this fall.
Those first two meetings had shown Liverpool’s season-long improvement under first-year head coach Nicole Charles. It had tied C-NS 2-2 on Sept. 28 at LHS Stadium, and then had gone to Bragman Stadium Oct. 13 to pull out a 2-1 decision.
When the sectional Class A playoff pairings came out, Liverpool and C-NS were paired once more. Battling wet conditions, the two sides played through a 60-minute regulation stalemate.
For Liverpool, that meant seeing defenders Jillian Chilbert, Danielle Wilson, Melina Castaldo and Emily Salanger work hard to block all of C-NS’s passing lanes and prevent too many shots from getting to goalie Brittany Cussen, with help from midfielder Katrina Bragan as she augmented her offensive skill set with tough defensive work.
So it went to the seven-on-seven OT period still 0-0, and it was one of the Warriors’ seniors, Socker, notching the game-winner to send Liverpool into the semifinals and end the Northstars’ season.
C-NS finished its season with a 7-9-1 record and will see nine seniors depart, including Margaret Ball, Emersyn Alberici, Bri Kehoe, Nessa McKie, Katherine LeRoy, Maria Mirizio, Abbey Szumloz, Jamie Snyder and Nina Trenca.
