CAPE ELIZABETH — When asked to describe what she saw when she scored the goal that put her team ahead for good, Cape Elizabeth senior Annaliese Rudberg paused.
“They all mash together. All our shots were really smart shots,” Rudberg said.
It wasn’t hubris on Rudberg’s part. She and the Cape Elizabeth girls’ lacrosse team did just about everything right in the second half of Wednesday night’s game against Freeport, overcoming a two-goal halftime deficit to take a 14-11 win.
Cape Elizabeth enters the Class A South playoffs at 6-6. Freeport (9-3) will likely be the top seed in the Class C tournament. All three of Freeport’s losses came to teams in either Class A or B.
With Cape trailing 8-5 late in the first half, Rudberg scored with 9 seconds left to cut the Falcons’ lead to 8-6 at the break. With 18:28 to play, Rudberg scored to tie the game at 9, then put the Capers ahead for good with a goal off a free position with 16:19 remaining.
“We say we flipped the switch. We really came out in the second half and played for each other,” said Rudberg, who scored four goals, three coming in the pivotal second half.
Claire McDonald scored back-to-back goals to push the Capers’ lead to 12-9. Freeport’s Savannah Tracy scored to cut Cape’s lead to 12-10 with 11:53 left and snap the Capers’ string of four straight goals, but Rudberg and Sadie Smith each scored to give the Capers a 14-10 cushion with just over five minutes left.
The second half was a stark contrast to most of the first. While Cape Elizabeth controlled play for much of the game’s first five minutes, it was unable to capitalize with a goal. Freeport then scored three quick goals, two from Meg Driscoll and one by Kate Tracy, to take a 3-0 lead with 16:54 left in the first half.
“With a good team like Freeport, we were expecting a really strong first half. We were a little frantic in the beginning,” Rudberg said.
The Falcons maintained their lead throughout the first half, making it 8-5 on Driscoll’s goal with 26.3 seconds left in the half. Beginning with Rudberg’s goal in the closing seconds of the half, though, the Capers dominated play the rest of the game.
“I think Cape just upped their game. I think we probably caught them off guard a little bit going up three goals. They did a really nice job adjusting. We didn’t adjust enough to their intensity,” said Freeport Coach Marcia Wood.
Driscoll scored four goals for Freeport, and Kate Tracy and Savannah Tracy each scored three. McDonald had four goals for Cape Elizabeth, and Smith added a pair.
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