WELLESLEY – They wanted no part of it. «My bad,» they thought.
After Wellesley High’s girls soccer team cruised to a 3-0 win over Newton North on a chilly Tuesday night, the Raiders didn’t mind posing with a Division 1 Final Four banner. But touching the trophy that goes with it? No deal.
2. Wellesley led for 78 minutes and beat North for the third time this fall. The Raiders scored three nice goals to win by 17th time, and then act like they’ve been here before.
They want another trophy next week.
«Dave told us it was bad mojo,» senior captain Annie Comella said. «We just didn’t want to mess with it.»
The Bay State Conference MVP was referring to Wellesley head coach Dave Wainwright, who has plenty of experience on the field. His Natick team won the state title a year ago, but the Needham boys lacrosse team he coaches in the spring captured the Final Four trophy, losing in the finals to St. John’s Prep.
«So I was like, ‘we’re not going to touch him right now,’» Wainwright said. «If you don’t have to touch it, why not?»
Wellesley (17-3-1) really hit a high on Tuesday, taking the lead in the opening two minutes when Leila Eccher tapped in an Ellery Gerhart corner kick. The early lead allowed the Raiders to relax after beating their Bay State Conference opponent twice in the regular season.
«Our big goal is to come out really intense,» Comella said. «In this case, we didn’t want to be a second-half team.»
Wellesley beat North 4-2 and 3-0 earlier in the season, and Wainwright tried to guard against complacency.
«That was 1,000 percent part of the fear coming into today: We’re getting too comfortable,» he said. «We sent a message early coming out of the gate that we were approaching them the right way.»
Peyton Keyes, also a senior captain, made it 2-0 after Comella fed her a free kick deep in the north field. Keyes’ cross was cleared by goalkeeper Alissa Kraus. But Eccher flicked the ball back to Keyes, who made a couple of moves before firing a left-footed shot into the far corner of the goal.
Keyes said the play was one of many the team chooses on the restart.
“This is a limit, not a rule. We have some free will in these kinds of shows,” she said. “Annie and I have already talked about it. We saw that there was a lot of space for their defense.»
Comella, who scored 28 goals in the regular season, got the final payoff when she also shot with her left. Hers, however, was from long range and netted the far corner with 15 minutes to go.
She said she didn’t put much thought into the game.
«You play your best when you use your instincts,» Comella said. “So I don’t think about my hitting as much when I play my best games, so I just used my instinct and hit it. You can too.»
The back line of Grace Sullivan, Lucy Thornton and Ava O’Grady played well in front of Wellesley goalkeeper Caroline Keyes as the Raiders earned their fourth shutout of the season.
Wellesley will play Thursday’s King Philip/Brookline winner in the state semifinals. The Raiders beat Brookline twice in the regular season, 3-1 and 2-0. The Warriors and Raiders are two of five teams from the Bay State Conference to reach the Elite 8.
This level of play will likely elevate one of these BSC teams to a national title.
«It’s good to be in a competitive league for the regular season because it prepares us for the playoffs,» Comella said. «To be one of the dominant teams in this league is an expectation for us and we have much bigger goals that we want to fulfill.»
Tim Dumas is a multimedia reporter for the Daily News. He can be reached at tdumas@wickedlocal.com. Follow him on Twitter @TimDumas.
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