Mt. Lebanon girls fall in WPIAL lacrosse final

Good is never sufficient when great is required.

Just ask the members of the Mt. Lebanon girls’ lacrosse team.

The Lebo ladies were good enough to reach the WPIAL Class AAA championship match on May 25 but it took a great effort by Pine-Richland to win the title. The Rams edged the Blue Devils, 13-12, at Robert Morris University’s Joe Walton Stadium.

“We played well enough,” said Lebo head coach Brian Kattan. “We just didn’t play great.

“P-R is a very good team. We did not lose to a bad team,” he noted. “We played well. We just didn’t beat them.”

Lebo fell one-goal short because it failed to convert two critical opportunities in the tightly contested match. The game was tied seven times, including 8-8 at halftime and 9-9 with 19:07 left in the second half.

The Rams owned the largest lead, 5-2, with 9:07 left in the first half. They also held two-goal advantages with 6:14 and 2:10 to play.

In between Lebo tallies by Tegan Hoover and Nora Austin, the Blue Devils had a player-up advantage for two minutes because of a yellow card infraction as well as the last possession within the final minute of play.

“We had the power play, missed and they scored. Things turned. That was the difference in the game. We had our shots, we just didn’t make them,” Kattan said.

“On the late possession, we were trying to get Addie (Murdoch) the ball but they tripled team her. We got what we wanted. A shot with less than 10 seconds left. A shot to go into overtime,” he continued. “It just did not go in.”

Murdoch did put the ball in the net five times during the game. The junior also registered two assists.

Hoover finished with a hat trick while Quinn Murdoch supplied two scores. Morgan Daniels completed the scoring with a goal and an assist.

With the loss, Lebo finished as the WPIAL runner-up for the third consecutive season.

“It’s tough losing three times but we have to look at the big picture,” Kattan said. “We got here three times.

“It’s not easy to get into a championship game three times in a row. They should be more proud of the fact they have been here three times in a row than down that they lost it again.”

While Pine-Richland improved to 18-3 with the win, Lebo dropped to 16-3 overall. Both teams have qualified for the PIAA tournament.

The Blue Devils will face the District 3 champion when the state playoffs commence June 6.

“States will be fun,” Kattan predicted.

There will be no state playoffs for Chartiers Valley. The Colts lost their bid for the PIAA berth when they fell to Quaker Valley, 15-11, in the WPIAL Class AA third-place consolation game.