By Tom Robinson, NEPASportsNation.com
KINGSTON – Emma George made the most of being perfectly positioned in front of the opposing goalie twice.
Krista Papura was where she was needed behind her own goalie two other times.
Together, George and Papura produced timely plays that helped lift Crestwood over Selinsgrove, 2-1, Nov. 2 for the District 2-4 Class 2A Subregional field hockey championship at Wyoming Seminary’s Nesbitt Stadium.
George scored the two Crestwood goals on a deflection and a rebound.
Papura had two of Crestwood’s three defensive saves. One came during a closing flurry in which Crestwood held off Selinsgrove over the final 90 seconds.
George opened and closed the scoring.
Selinsgrove was still looking for its first shot when George deflected an Emma Guydish shot on a penalty corner with 8:08 left in the first quarter.
“Emma Guydish has like the perfect drives and it’s just a matter of having the right stick angle to get it in the back of the cage,” George said.
George scored again on a rebound in the second quarter, breaking a tie.
The final 39:34 was scoreless.
Selinsgrove had gone the first 12 minutes without a shot or penalty corner before Carly Aument set up Emily Fry’s tying goal on the Seals’ first scoring chance.
The Seals threatened to tie the game again late in a similar scenario.
Crestwood had not given up a shot or penalty corner for 21:07 before Selinsgrove put together constant and extreme pressure over the game’s closing sequence.
The Seals had half of their dozen penalty corners in the final 2:38. Those resulted in half of the team’s 14 shots during the final 1:30.
“It can get hard at the end when the other teams gets that little burst of energy of motivation to try to tie it back up,” Crestwood coach Patsy Moratori said.
Isabella Caporuscio made four of her nine saves in goal during the closing flurry. When the Seals lifted one shot over her and got another past her on rebounds, defenders Papura and Kylah Kelly were in position at each post to knock away the scoring chances.
Still another Selinsgrove chance resulted in an Alexis Freed shot hitting the post.
“We didn’t want to go into overtime,” Papura said. “We wanted the game to be over so we could celebrate.”
Crestwood moves on to host a first-round game in the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association Class 2A tournament against Villa Maria Academy.
