The Northampton field hockey team came into their district quarterfinal game at Nazareth on Thursday on the wrong side of several streaks. They were 0-5 in their last 5 playoff games (4 by 1 goal, 3 in double overtime or shootout), winless against the Blue Eagles since 2020 (0-6-1 in that span), and had not scored against Nazareth’s Mackenzie Mann, the 2023 EPC first-team All-Star goalie, in the last 12 regulation quarters and 4 overtime periods.

It took just under 4 minutes for the K-Kids to quench their goal-scoring drought, as they converted on their first corner of the night. Ella Steirer got the tally with an assist by Kendall Iasiello.

“Setting the tone, 4 minutes in… We practiced all week moving the goalie, not taking the straight shots, and getting those third and fourth efforts. I was very pleased it paid off early,” said head coach Carrie Saul.

With an early lead, Northampton was able to shift to a defense-first mindset with a core component of that strategy keeping possession of the ball away from the Blue Eagles. The K-Kids held Nazareth without a shot on goal for the entire first half and went into the break up 1-0.

The start of the second half echoed the beginning of the game. Northampton earned a corner 3 minutes in and 64 seconds later a shot from Grace Roberts deflected off a Nazareth stick and into the cage to stake the Kids to a 2-0 lead.

That was still the margin when a flurry in front of the Northampton goal resulted in Nazareth being awarded a penalty stroke. Octavia Reichelderfer faced down the Blue Eagles’ shooter from 7 yards away and made a save that generated as much euphoria as either K-Kids’ goal.

Reichelderfer described the moment, “It’s definitely nerve-wracking because everyone’s staring at you. I just wanted to do good for the seniors so that we could keep advancing for them. I love all the seniors on the team. I went into this game super pumped, and we played exactly as I expected us to.”

Nazareth did score a goal with 54 seconds left in the third quarter to keep everyone in attendance on pins and needles during the final period, but the K-Kids kept their composure down the stretch and closed out the win.

Senior captain Kendall Iasiello described the experience of hanging on to a narrow lead, “It was stressful. But we called timeout to get calmed down and we got our passing going. We were able keep possession and stay on offense which helped.”

Sister and co-captain Raegan Iasiello explained how meaningful the win was, “It’s awesome. This is such a revenge season for us. We put so much effort into this year and it’s so awesome to see the effort pay off.”