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FREEPORT — It had the look of a trap game, and late in the first quarter, it was starting to play out like one. The undefeated Freeport girls lacrosse team took a quick three-goal lead, only to watch York answer with two goals.

Marcia Wood didn’t like what she was seeing. So with just over three minutes to go in the first quarter, the Falcons coach called a timeout.

“The defense was fine. It was clearing it out, we had too many turnovers,” she said. “So that timeout was ‘Let’s calm our nerves for a second.'”

It worked. The Falcons showed their firepower soon after, with Lana DiRusso and Mia Levesque finishing with six goals apiece as top-seeded Freeport defeated No. 8 York, 18-6, in a Class B South quarterfinal.

Freeport, which also got three goals from Emma White and five saves from Hailey Curtis, improved to 15-0. York, which got a pair of goals from Ava Fontaine and Sophia Luchette, finished 6-10.

Key moments

• After York’s Lucy Taylor and Sophia Luchette answered Freeport goals by Levesque, White and DiRusso, Wood called a timeout with 3:23 to go in the first quarter. Elsa Klein and DiRusso scored before the end of the first quarter, and DiRusso, Levesque and White had tallies to start the second quarter, putting Freeport up 8-2.

“Honestly, I think it was our little timeout here,” DiRusso answered when asked what allowed Freeport to pull away. “We get flustered a lot in the beginnings of games. … I think just having a moment to come together and take a deep breath really helps us gather ourselves and realize it’s not the end of the world if they score.”

• York’s Ava Fontaine got the next goal to make it 8-3, but Levesque, White and DiRusso then struck again to extend the margin to 11-3 going into halftime.

• Fontaine scored on a free position and Luchette converted a feed from Emma Joyce to make it 11-5 with 6:18 to go in the third quarter. But after a York penalty, Gwen Dunham, Levesque and DiRusso scored for Freeport during the advantage, putting the game out of reach.

Falcons avoid the trap

• Despite the disparity in the seedings and incongruity of the records, the Wildcats had reason to hope for an upset. York hung with Freeport before falling 15-10 on May 30 and was tested against Class A competition, dropping games to Falmouth, Cheverus and Yarmouth by a total of four goals.

The Falcons knew not to overlook York.

“You can’t take any team lightly in the playoffs,” Levesque said. “It doesn’t matter who teams have played, it doesn’t matter if you’ve beat them, it doesn’t matter who they’ve beat. It’s a clean slate, it’s a fresh restart, and you have to understand upsets can happen.”

Individual statistics

• Freeport: Lana DiRusso (six goals), Mia Levesque (six goals), Emma White (three goals), Elsa Klein, Gwen Dunham, Ella Tracy (one goal each), Hailey Curtis (five saves), Maddie Kryzak (four saves)

• York: Sophia Luchette (two goals), Ava Fontaine (two goals), Lucy Taylor (goal), Ella Neiverth (goal), Piper Schambach (five saves)

Notable quotes

• “It’s hard to never lose, and going into playoffs completely undefeated, it comes with a huge amount of pressure. There’s expectation. Everyone expects us to be at states, everyone expects us to have a cakewalk to states, and that’s something that we really need to get out of our heads. That can completely destroy your mentality.” — Lana DiRusso

• “It doesn’t matter. They have a tough schedule. And it’s York. They’re athletic. They’ve always been athletic.” — Marcia Wood, on being a higher seed.

• “Draw control, as we always say, win the draw, rule the world. And they definitely had many draw controls today, and those 50/50 balls are what make and break the game.” — York coach Jesse Kohler