SCARBOROUGH — A playoff spot was never in doubt.
Neither, really, was the sewing up of home field for a round or two of the Western Maine Class A girls lacrosse playoffs.
Now, top seed, that would have been nice, but that would have meant upsetting defending state champion Scarborough on its home field in Thursday’s regular season finale.
However, Kennebunk fell just short of that quest, dropping a tough, 12-11 tilt on the turf at the Kippy Mitchell Athletic Complex.
Taylor Crowley scored three goals and Molly Centore added two for the Rams, who wrapped up the regular season with a 10-2 mark.
Scarborough is 11-0.
“I think if we came with a little bit more fire,” said Kennebunk coach Annie Barker, “it would have been a little bit different. We needed that fire.”
The Rams held a 3-2 lead when, 7:32 into the contest, Taylor Crowley popped in her second goal of the day, both of which came off of Camille Auger set ups.
Kennebunk stayed even with Scarborough for nearly 14 minutes. It held that advantage for six minutes until the Red Storm took off on a five-goal run that gave them a 7-3 lead with 2:01 to play in the half.
But just before intermission, Kate Graydon cashed in a feed from Auger to make it 8-5.
“You need to come with 110 percent at this time of year,” Barker said. “That’s what you need.”
Auger opened the second half scoring at 21 seconds, cutting the margin to two goals.
From that point, Kennebunk kept up the chase, but couldn’t overtake the Storm.
Twice in that half, the Rams trailed by three goals but still managed to creep to within one.
The last time came after Scarborough’s Kelsey Howard tallied with 6:59 to play to make it 12-9.
The Rams rallied, scoring twice in the final 1:15 to make it a one goal game.
Crowley netted her third goal of the game to bring the Rams to within 12-10.
Then, as time ticked away, Kennebunk middie Rose Bryant made a midfield theft and bore down on Scarborough goalie Meg Kirsch, before parking her shot with 14 seconds to go.
Scarborough, however, controlled the ensuing face off and buttoned down the win.
Kennebunk will be idle throughout the next week while waiting to learn of its first playoff opponent.
“It would have been nice to get that No. 1 (seed),” said Barker. “To get that bye in the first round.”
— Contact Dan Hickling at dhickling@journaltribune.com or follow on Twitter @DanHickling.
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