Wilson will attempt to successfully defend its BCIAA title on Saturday after the second-seeded Bulldogs beat sixth-seeded Daniel Boone 4-0 in a Berks Field Hockey League semifinal Wednesday night at West Lawn.
In what will be a rematch of the 2022 championship game, Wilson will face top-seeded Oley Valley (18-1-1) at Alvernia University at 6 p.m. The Lynx defeated fourth-seeded Twin Valley 4-0 in the other semifinal.
The Bulldogs (14-6) won last year’s contest 2-1.
“It always feels good to play again,” Bulldogs coach Kim Underwood said. “This is a great group of girls that, many of them, are gonna get to experience county finals for the first time because we graduated so many players last year and not many of them have had that experience before.
“I’m super excited for them to come into the game leaving everything on the field, and just knowing that they worked hard, they played their best and are trying to do everything we can to win the game.”
Wilson did everything and more to advance to the final by dominating possession for most of Wednesday night’s game and outshooting the Blazers 16-0.
Sophomore Sophie Wilcheck scored a two goals for the Bulldogs and both were assisted by junior Evelyn Melograna.
“It feels really good,” Wilcheck said. “We’ve been working really well as a team with ball movement, and we saw a lot of improvements since the last game.
“We’ve worked really hard on our communication on our press and we’ve found a lot of improvements.”
Junior Cameran Huyett opened the scoring and was assisted by freshman Sidni Templeton with 4:18 remaining in the first quarter.
Despite Wilson getting five shots on goal and five corners in the second quarter, Daniel Boone’s defense held tough. Blazers junior goalie Bre Marchiano made six saves in the first half to keep it 1-0 at halftime.
Marchiano finished with 12 saves. The Blazers were making their first appearance in the Berks semifinals since 1996.
“This has been a season of tremendous growth with a team of highly physical athletes that were highly motivated to grow and believe in themselves as the season progressed,” Daniel Boone coach Autumn Gilmore said. “We adjusted to every adversity that we’ve encountered and really formed a team and a positive culture.”
Wilcheck scored her first goal with 3:50 remaining in the third quarter off a corner as she shot from deep to give Wilson a 2-0 lead.
Junior Caroline Horace scored with 13:07 left off an assist from senior Mallory Sauppee. Wilcheck closed the scoring with her second goal with 10:43 to go.
A substantial defensive effort paved the way for the offense to have consistent scoring opportunities, according to Underwood and Wilcheck.
“Our defense played a solid game tonight, really smart handling the ball under any pressure that they were putting on us and taking care of the ball and getting it out of the backfield quickly,” Underwood said. “She (Wilcheck) is one of our top strikers on the ball for corners, so I think she did a really good job of receiving the ball well from Melograna, who was inserting it really smoothly to her, and then made smart decisions on what the defense was giving her.”
“We work really well together on defense, that’s been a key point throughout our whole season,” Wilcheck said.
Heading into the final with the Lynx, who defeated Wilson 4-1 earlier in the season, the Bulldogs know they will be facing a tough task, but remain confident.
“They have the ability and they have potential; Oley’s a great team,” Underwood said. “We faced them already once the season and I think we’re probably going to see that both teams have improved since we played each other, so I think they’re going to be ready and we’re gonna give our best shots be ready as well.”
“We feel really good,” Wilcheck said. “We’re excited to go into the final.”
Source: Berkshire mont