The Arrowhead Red girls lacrosse team collectively held up four fingers in their team picture, representing the program’s fourth consecutive trip to the Wisconsin Lacrosse Federation’s state championship game. However, that doesn’t mean all the current Warhawks – even the enviable senior class that runs 19 deep – have experienced any or all of those title runs.
And if anyone is wondering where the motivation for Arrowhead stems from after so many dominant seasons under coach Tom Truttschel, there it is – getting everyone a chance to raise the trophy.
“We have less than half of this group that went to state last year, so they’re motivated for the teammates who haven’t been there yet,” Truttschel said after Arrowhead’s convincing 15-2 victory over Franklin. “Also, they want that two-peat or three-peat for themselves, so the fire is there.”
Arrowhead (16-6) made early work of Franklin (10-6) by starting the game with an 8-0 run before the Sabers could get on the board. Senior attack Lexy Chatham scored two of her game-high four goals to close out the first half, sending the Warhawks into intermission with a 10-1 lead.
“My teammates found me in the circle, and if it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t have those goals,” Chatham said. “We’ve been working really hard on our offense lately.”
Truttschel said Chatham has been the key to Arrowhead’s offense this year, knowing just the right buttons to push to make the Warhawks go in any situation.
“Lexy is our quarterback on offense,” he said. “She really calms our team down on offense when she needs to. She’s got a smart lax I.Q. – she knows when to look for her teammates and when to slow it down to take a one-on-one. She’s grown a lot in these last two years, and she’s one of our leaders on offense.”
Senior attack Emily Dvorak added three goals for the Warhawks, as well. Senior attack Sophie Elrod and sophomore middie Jacklyn Batley scored two goals apiece for Arrowhead.
When Franklin managed to break through to the Arrowhead side of the field, senior goalie Amanda Catalano made some incredible saves.
“She had an amazing game tonight with a lot of saves,” Truttschel said. “We had thought about switching to into a man defense, but we stayed with our solid zone defense. We thought maybe we’d isolate a few of their top players, but we saw no reason to do that as long as we play our top game.”
As the Sabers’ impressive postseason run ended, so did the high-school careers of senior captains Jackie Krueger, Dani Lindsay and Jess Lucht, who scored one of Franklin’s two goals on the night. Franklin coach Jill Kyhn realizes her seniors won’t be easily replaced, but the future is bright for young team with a high ceiling.
“[The seniors] literally were the first girls in line when we said we were holding a lacrosse clinic, so they are just great leaders,” Kyhn said. “We’ve got a really good core group of returning players, some of which improved drastically this year.”
Arrowhead will face Whitefish Bay/Nicolet/Shorewood at Carroll University’s Schneider Stadium Friday at 7:30 p.m. The Wolfpack defeated University of School Milwaukee, 8-4, to advance to the state finals.
