They put up quite a fight.
But in the end, the Faith Christian field hockey team fell just shy of the District One Class A title, falling to Pope John Paul II 5-4 on Monday night at Wissahickon in the district championship game.
PJP (13-7), which hails from the competitive Pioneer Athletic Conference, put the pressure on in the first quarter, but the Lions (15-5) held them off. Faith’s only scoring chance came on a breakaway by Amaly Klock, but she was thwarted by the speedy PJP defense.
The Golden Panthers, seeded fifth in the tourney, netted the first goal of the evening less than two minutes into the second quarter and added a second off a corner a few minutes later to take a 2-0 lead into halftime.
“They came at us hard in the first quarter and we didn’t let them score, and I’m really proud of that,” said Faith senior defender Melanie Brancheau.
“I felt really good about it and it was a confidence boost. In our semifinal game against Dock (Mennonite), it was 0-0 at the half and we came out and won that one, so I thought we could do it, that we were right there.”
The second half saw the third-seeded Lions come alive, as Daniella Burns scored on a corner five minutes into play. PJP netted two more in the third quarter to end the frame with a rather hefty 4-1 lead.
That lead was not as comfortable as it appeared to be.
The Golden Panthers scored their final goal of the game off a direct corner five minutes into the fourth quarter to take a 5-1 lead, likely unaware of how critical that last goal would actually be.
Burns started the comeback off for Faith with her second goal of the night.
“It was really exciting to score two goals in our first district final,” said Burns, a junior forward. “I think if we had played the whole game the way we played the last quarter we would have won this game.
“It was a big momentum switch, and the score shows that we were right in there.
“We had never played them before and I think it was good for us to see a team as good as they are. It was a good test.”
Throughout the first three quarters the Lions had netted just one penalty corner, but they got six in the fourth quarter and made one pay when Klock found the back of the cage with 2:22 remaining to cut the deficit down to 5-3.
With just 21 seconds to go, freshman Cheyenne Greene scored the final goal of the game to bring Faith to within one.
“I’m really, really proud of how we never quit,” Brancheau said. “We just kept working and we were able to close that gap and if we’d had just a little more time I think we could have won it.”
It was the first trip to the title game for the Lions and a game effort, quite a feat for a program that is only in its second year of competition.
“This was a big opportunity for us,” said Klock, a junior forward. “We didn’t get this far last year so this is all new for us, but we’re showing that we can do it. I feel like we weren’t fully ready for it, for the kinds of teams we’d be playing.
“We need to step up. We weren’t ready for the kind of momentum they (PJP) had. This game showed us where we need to be and what we need to do to be competitive at this level.”
Faith still has a chance to get to its first-ever PIAA tournament. On Thursday, the Lions travel to District 12 champion Lansdale Catholic for a regional qualifying game, with the winner guaranteed a state berth.
“We saw what Pope John Paul had and that was a good lesson for us,” Klock said. “We let our nerves get the best of us in the beginning of the game. We weren’t mentally prepared for the level of play and the aggressiveness that this team showed us.
“Going into the Lansdale Catholic game, now we know what to expect and we need to be ready and tough. We know what’s at stake but this time we won’t be as nervous. It’s a second chance and it would be stupid for us to waste it.
“We’ve come pretty far pretty fast and we’re proud of that, but we’d still like to get to the next level.”
If the Lions play as well as they did in the fourth quarter of this game, Brancheau thinks they will be in good shape.
“We need to take the momentum that we had at the end of this game and bring it into the Lansdale Catholic game,” she said. “We tend to go into games a little slow, that’s been our struggle, and if we can not do that and just bring what we had at the end of this game, we’ll be fine.
“I think maybe some people were nervous at the beginning of the game because we wanted to win. To be district champions in our second year would have been huge. But I still think it’s great that we got here and we still have another shot.”
Pope John Paul II will play District 12 runner-up Conwell-Egan in the other regional qualifier, with the winner also advancing to states.
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