Despite Adversity Coming Into The Game, East Hampton/Pierson Girls Lacrosse Pulls Off Victory Over Deer Park

The likelihood of the East Hampton/Pierson girls lacrosse team earning their first win this past Friday wasn’t all that high.

Coming off of their fifth-straight loss to start the season two days prior, the Bonackers were going to be without their starting goalie in East Hampton senior Laura Calderon, who had suffered a concussion in that 19-4 loss at Mattituck/Southold.

But, as the saying goes, that’s why they play the games.

The Bonackers defeated Deer Park, 12-11, at home to earn their first victory, and it was not easy by any means, starting off the game with a 3-0 deficit in the first minute. But East Hampton sophomore Melina Sarlo’s free position goal, her third of the game, with 48 seconds remaining wound up being the difference. Winning possession on the ensuing faceoff basically wrapped up the victory as the Bonackers stormed to field to celebrate.

“We really worked hard for that and didn’t give up even when there were three minutes left and we were tied. We kept going,” said East Hampton junior Claire McGovern, who scored a team-high four goals in the victory.

“I think we had great transition in the midfield and we’ve been working really hard on that so I think we’ve improved a lot since our first game,” said East Hampton senior Ella Bistrian, who was one of seven different Bonackers who found the back of the net. East Hampton freshman Ava Tintle, sophomores Emma McGrory and Lola Garneau and junior Scout Lynch all scored as well.

“And to start in the first few minutes down three goals and to come back from that, that’s an amazing feeling,” said East Hampton sophomore Ruby Tyrrell, who filled in as goalie for Calderon.

After McGrory’s nifty little pass to an incoming McGovern who scored to give East Hampton an 11-9 victory with 4:28 remaining in the game, it seemed that as long as they could add another goal or two, that the Bonackers would be a lock for the victory. But to Deer Park’s credit, it didn’t go down without a fight, eventually knotting the game up at 11 with 1:54 remaining.

East Hampton head coach Jessica Sanna took a well-planned timeout with 1:29 remaining in the game with her offense with possession of the ball in Deer Park’s defensive third, but her team turned the ball over just as quickly as the whistle blew to start the game back up. Thankfully for East Hampton, McGrory was able to get back on defense quickly to draw a charging foul on an Deer Park man-up breakaway. That eventually set up Sarlo’s game-winning goal.

Sanna gave a lot of credit to her defense, made up largely of Pierson players, which it needed being that Tyrrell didn’t have a ton of experience in goal. Tyrrell typically plays defense, but to her credit, stepped up and played a big role on Friday, making seven saves and clearing the ball when she needed to.

“Really proud of her,” Sanna said.

The season had gotten off to a pretty rocky start for East Hampton, losing all five games by an average of 11-plus goals per game. But things seem to click on Friday and the team is looking to build off of the win.

“Our successes have been progress success,” Sanna said. “We set a goal for each game even when we play teams that we know are going to be very challenging. I knew this was going to be a tight game and I think they really stepped up and I think it will give them a little bit of confidence and hopefully some momentum moving forward throughout the rest of the season.”

East Hampton played at Southampton on Tuesday and then will have two weeks off before playing in its next scheduled game at home against West Islip on April 26 at 4:30 p.m.