While it's the offense that gets the lion's share of the attention in most sports, the defense often winds up winning championships. In picking up their 26th straight district title, the Emmaus Hornets field hockey team can credit its defense with having played a big role in the success.

Consider some of the numbers.

Emmaus has racked up 15 shutouts in 24 games this season and has allowed just nine goals all season long. Emmaus played Easton (16-4-1), Nazareth (10-9-1), Whitehall (12-8-1) and Stroudsburg (21-1-2) twice and each team picked up a total of one goal against the Hornets. They played Parkland (11-7-2) and Northampton (13-8-0) three times and allowed only three goals in those six games, all of which were scored by Parkland, the only team to generate multiple goals against the Hornets.

Senior goalkeeper Tori Laczo made a total of 90 saves this season for the Hornets and was named to the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference Second Team All-Stars, but was the only member of the Emmaus defense to have made the conference squad.

Perhaps one reason why Laczo wasn't on the first team is because she simply didn't have to defend as many shots thanks to the defenders in front of her. Easton's Alex Pennington, who got the nod for the first team made a total of 149 saves during the season.

In the win over Stroudsburg in the District 11 Finals, the Emmaus defense again threw a shutout and were just the second tean this season to keep the Mounties off the board. The only other time that Stroudsburg was held scoreless was in a 0-0 tie with Wilkes-Barre Coughlin.

"The corner D played especially well today," said coach Sue Butz-Stavin. "Chloe [Tostevin], our freshman, she had a tough job today, because she had to keep Jenn Bukowski from touching the ball and she did an excellent job. I have to give her credit. She's a tough kid and I was happy that she was able to hold up on that."

Bukowski, who easily led the Mounties in goals (34) this season, scored the only goal in the EPC finals to give Stroudsburg the title, but Butz-Stavin trusted her freshman to step up to the challenge in her second shot against Bukowski in districts.

"She [Butz-Stavin] was telling me that I should step in front of her and get ahead of her, so she couldn't get to the ball," said Tostevin. "I felt like I did a good job of that and just covering her the whole game. The last game we played against them I didn't feel that I did as well, but this time I think I covered her better."

Even though Emmaus opened the year with five straight shutouts, Tostevin believes the defense is better now than it was at the beginning of the season, which bodes well for Emmaus in the PIAA Tournament.

"In the beginning, we weren't as much of a unit and all together, but throughout the season we started to get to know each other and know each other as a player," said Tostevin. "We got a lot better at transferring the ball."

For a freshman to be starting for a program as strong as Emmaus is quite an accomplishment, but Tostevin says that her teammates have made it easy.

"It hasn't been that difficult," said Tostevin. "It's really awesome that I get to start and play and I'm surprised with myself about how well I'm doing. It wasn't that difficult, because the other girls gave me a lot of help."