SKOWHEGAN — The Skowhegan Area High School field hockey team beat Cony twice in the regular season by five goals in each game. On Friday afternoon, the Indians were quick to point out that those results had no bearing on how they approached their regional semifinal against the Rams.

“We weren’t going to let ourselves think it was going to be an easy game. We come into all our games thinking it’s going to be hard, and we play our hardest,” junior back Lizzie York said.

Added sophomore forward Alexis Michonski: “It’s a new game every time, and we work at it.”

With that in mind, Skowhegan controlled play right from the start and through most of the game to take a 4-1 victory in a Class A North semifinal.

The Indians scored a pair of goals in each half to reach the regional final Tuesday at Hampden Academy. The two-time defending state champion and winner of 14 of the last 16 Class A state titles, Skowhegan (15-1) will play for its 17th consecutive regional crown. No. 4 Cony ended the season at 8-7-1.

“I’m incredibly proud of my girls. We didn’t back down. We challenged them,” Cony coach Holly Daigle said. “We didn’t let them have a lot of space when they had the ball. We wanted to come and play a tough game (Friday), and my girls did.”

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While Cony did its best to keep pressure on Skowhegan, the Indians controlled things throughout the game. Skowhegan had 17 penalty corners to Cony’s five, and most of the action was in the Rams defensive zone.

Skowhegan scored a pair of goals in the first 10 minutes of the game to take control. Julia Steeves scored with an assist from Haley Carter with 26 minutes to play in the first half, just after a penalty corner opportunity. With 22:38 to play in the first half, Maliea Kelso was awarded a penalty stroke. Kelso shot high, giving the Indians a 2-0 cushion.

Just over three minutes into the second half, Michonski scored on an assist from Bhreagh Kennedy to push Skowhegan’s lead to 3-0. With 12:52 left in the game, Kelso scored her second goal, breaking in and again going high to give the Indians a 4-0 lead.

“I think we kept good pressure on. I think we had lapses that we can’t have when we get to the last two games. We met a lot of our goals today,” Skowhegan coach Paula Doughty said.

Cony, which was shutout 5-0 in each of the regular season games against Skowhegan, broke the shut out when Faith Leathers-Pouliot scored on an assist from Sophie Whitney with 5:21 remaining.

“We were talking, even just before the game, we were 3-6-1 at one point. That was a tough way to start the season. We had five straight wins. We got in a groove. We all got on the same page,” Daigle said. “I’ve had so much fun with these girls, watching them grow and watching them improve.”

Travis Lazarczyk — 861-9242

tlazarczyk@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @TLazarczykMTM


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