Girls Lacrosse Rolls Against Walpole, Baseball Advances

The Wolverines continued their winning ways Friday night and their latest victims were the Walpole Rebels.

Westwood dismantled the No. 9 seed Walpole 21-4, eliminating them from the playoffs and advancing to the South Semifinals on Wednesday against the No. 4 ranked Wellesley (14-1-1).

The Rebels played their hearts out for the first 10 minutes, and contained the high-octane Wolverine offense better than most teams have thus far.

“We did a good job just playing physical and having an idea of what they wanted to do and we competed hard and played well,” said Walpole head coach TimDrummey. “The hard part is though, they’re such talented players, you can know what’s coming and they’re still going to execute the play even if you are in good position.”

Walpole railed just 4-1 with 10 minutes gone by and forced the majority of Westwood shots to be from the outside.

The combination of physical play plus the first goal allowed by Westwood, putting Walpole on the board with 15:48 remaining really woke up the number one seed.

“They were on fire and ferocious and I think that jumpstarted our kids,” said Westwood head coach Leslie Frank. “The biggest thing that we struggle with is our pace throughout the game. We know how to turn it on but once we turn it off or slow down, we really struggle to get up again so Walpole’s intensity was like igniting the fire and thank God they did. If it had stayed close, they could’ve got up on us.”

Westwood's Kate Rich scored two goals immediately following the score by Walpole’s Erin Richardson, and the Wolverines never looked back from there. Sarah Biron added three goals before the half and the Wolverines out-shot Walpole 20-7 and took a 12-3 lead into the break.

Rebel goalkeeper Erin Nelligan did whatever she could to stop the bleeding, saving six shots in the first half and preventing even more bleeding.

“She was awesome. She forced us to be patient and to take more time with our shots,” said Frank.

Westwood carried its momentum over into the second half and appeared to wear down a young Rebel team, which is made up of more than half underclassmen. They allowed just one shot the entire half, which happened to be a goal, and outscored Walpole once again, 11-1.

Nelligan added three more saves in the second half. Westwood’s Mollie Brown didn’t see many opportunities but nonetheless managed five saves.

Laura McHoul led the Westwood attack with five goals and four assists and Kate Rich had four goals and two assists. Sarah Biron finished with four as well, Marina Burke put in three and Emily McGrail and Ela Hazar had two each. Jamison O’Neil put in the final goal for the Wolverines with just under two minutes remaining.

Captain Sarah Buckley added two goals for the Rebels including their lone second-half goal. 

Meanwhile, baseball was just as impressive Friday, as . Will Smith pitched the first six innings for Westwood and Brendan Skehill came in for the final inning of work.

Brett Egizi came up big with a grand for the Wolverines who now travel to the No. 2 seeded Abington Saturday at 3 p.m.