Boasting a No. 12 state and No. 38 national ranking, the powerhouse Los Gatos High girls lacrosse team looks to be on a collision course to play St. Ignatius or Sacred Heart Prep—two of the top 10 teams in the nation—in the semifinals of the Central Coast Section playoffs in May.
Wildcats coach Tes Hayton acknowledged it would be a huge undertaking to beat one of those teams—St. Ignatius is No. 1 in the nation and Sacred Heart Prep is the defending CCS champion—but even a loss to SI or SHP wouldn’t dampen what the Wildcats (8-0 overall, 5-0 SCVAL) have already accomplished and what they expect to achieve this season.
They already own wins against Robert Louis Stevenson and St. Francis, two section powers. Barring a rash of injuries that take half the team’s roster out, they’ll cruise to the Santa Clara Valley League championship. And they’re building a program that has the benefit of having strong club programs Verve and the Red Hawks in the area feeding into the high school.
That means most of the players who enter as freshmen have experience and even the ones who don’t learn quickly because of the competitive yet fun environment.
“It’s a great team dynamic. Everyone is super close to each other and everyone loves to be around each other,” said senior goalie Maddie Holloway, who is set to play at Division I program George Mason next year. “Everyone here wants to win and is super passionate about lacrosse so we all share that same passion and it’s great to see it all work together on the field.”
Holloway showed why she’s a Division I-bound goalie, intercepting numerous passes and displaying cat-quick reflexes in a 13-0 win over Palo Alto High on March 24. Possessing fast hands and feet, Holloway deflected or made a save on every Palo Alto shot that came her way.
Hayton said Holloway and another senior captain Lily Brennan are key to the defense. High school girls lacrosse tends to have a lot of scoring so it’s no small feat when a team can produce a shutout.
“Maddie and Lily help coordinate the defense,” Hayton said. “They both do a great job. Maddie is just amazing and was born to be a lacrosse goalie. She’s done a lot of work, lots of different programs and just worked her butt off to get to where she is.”
The Wildcats go 28 players deep, or usually double what most opponents have. That means Hayton can substitute liberally and not worry about too much of a dropoff in play. Nine different players scored against Palo Alto, led by Sam Elliott and Alex Evans who scored three goals each.
Elliott and Tessa Dennon had several nice give and go combinations in the first half which resulted in the two scoring four of the team’s first five goals. Los Gatos put on a clinic with their stick work, ball handling, zone play and transitions.
“Transitions at Los Gatos, that is something we are proud of,” Hayton said. “We want to have the (best) transitions and you can’t have them without well formulated stick work and ball work. The girls come into the program with good lacrosse IQ as well.”
A good portion of the game was spent in Palo Alto’s 8-meter arc, as Los Gatos had the superior athletes and experience to control the possession and make strong runs. Players like Ava Bannon often juked Palo Alto players in the open field en route to the goal.
Natasha Evenden, Keira Dodd, Elliott, Dennon and Evans along with others helped the team dominate the possession time. Four players from the Wildcats’ field hockey CCS championship winning team are on the lacrosse team, so it’s no coincidence the latter squad is having tremendous success.
There are parallels between the two sports and players like Elliott, Evenden, Holloway and Teagan Fogerty are standouts in both. Holloway was ecstatic with the Palo Alto shutout because she knew it took a terrific team effort.
“Communication is always key on defense and that is probably one of the biggest things that helped us get that shutout,” she said.
Hayton said the team was actually a little out of sorts in the early going before it found its rhythm.
“The first 15 to 20 minutes was a little bit chaotic,” Hayton said with a chuckle. “All in all the girls had a lot of different motivations for the game and I think they ended up being happy with it.”
Sports editor Emanuel Lee can be reached at [email protected]
