WESTFIELD, Mass. – Westfield State grad student Kylie Buchanan (Westfield, Mass.) scored eight goals and added an assist to power the #2-seeded Owls to a 22-10 win over #3 Worcester State in the Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference women's lacrosse semifinals.
Westfield (11-7) advances to the MASCAC Championship game on Saturday. The Owls will travel to play #1 Framingham State at 7:00 p.m. at Maple Street Field, adjacent the FSU campus. The winner will earn the league's automatic bid to the NCAA Division 3 Championships.
Westfield used a 4-0 run to close the first quarter to break open what had been a tightly-contested game early.
The two teams traded goals in the early going, as Megan Bailey (Quincy, Mass.) and Natalie DeMaio (Westwood) got on the board for the Owls, with Worcester answering each time with a Shannon Donahue (Dennis, Mass.) goal for a 2-2 tie after seven minutes of play.
From there, the Owls began to extend their lead rattling off four consecutive goals, two from Buchanan, in the final 6:48 of the first quarter to lead 6-2 at the end of the first quarter.
Westfield led 10-5 after the Lancers' Mackayla Fisher (Peabody, Mass.) tallied with 3:16 left in the first half, but Westfield again pulled away with three goals from three different Owls in the final 2:49 of the half, with Kiely Hafensteiner (Niskayuna, NY) handing out assists on two of them, and Westfield led 13-5 at the half.
The Owls extended the lead to 16-6 to briefly get the clock to running time, after Arianna Andresen (Port Jefferson Station, NY) fed Buchanan from the right side on both goals, the second with 11:21 left in the third quarter.
Worcester wasn't done, adding four-goal run of their own with four different goal scorers in the spurt, the last by Ashley Hurley (Feeding Hills, Mass.) on a feed from Fisher with 2:28 left in the third, trimming the Owls lead to 16-10.
Westfield again closed the quarter with a burst, netting back-to-back goals, the second at the third-quarter buzzer as Emma Prattson (Tolland, Conn.) snared a loose ball and found DeMaio open in the center of the fan for an 18-10 Westfield lead heading to the fourth quarter.
Westfield kept Worcester off the scoreboard in the fourth quarter, getting the clock back into running time on Prattson's goal with 7:29 left in the game.
Buchanan, a graduate transfer from Western New England had her best game as an Owl after missing five games due to an injury during the middle section of the season. DeMaio added five goals for the Owls, Prattson netted three goals and five assists, and Hafensteiner finished with two goals and four assists as the Owls posted their second-highest scoring output of the season.
Kara Banagan (Niskayuna, N.Y.) started in goal for Westfield and made seven saves in the opening 30 minutes. Sydney Smith (Dalton, Mass./Wahconah) played the second half and made three saves.
Worcester's season comes to an end with a 10-9 record. The Lancers were led by three goals and an assist from Abigail Wing (Griswold, Conn). Donahue finished with two goals. Olivia LaValle (Peabody, Mass.) made 11 saves for the Lancers.
Westfield will meet Framingham in the conference title game for the fifth time since 2018. Framingham topped #4 Bridgewater State 14-7 in the other semifinal round game tonight.
Westfield fell to Framingham, 15-14 in overtime in their regular season meeting just last Saturday.
The Owls topped the Rams 21-15 in 2023 in the title game. Framingham last captured a MASCAC crown in 2022 when the Owls were eliminated in the semifinals.
Westfield has beaten the Rams all four times they have met in the MASCAC finals.
The Owls took a 14-13 decision in 2021 as current Owl senior DeMaio scored with five seconds left to lift Westfield to the win, defeated the rams 13-12 in 2019, and Westfield won by a 17-10 count in 2018.
Westfield will be looking for it's sixth MASCAC tournament title overall.