By Donald Heath

Special for the Effingham Herald

SPRINGFIELD – Effingham County’s girls are hardly strangers to the lacrosse state playoffs, but the sport is still new to this area and postseason play usually means being pitted against more experienced Atlanta schools.

And that usually means a beatdown.

But 2024 has been a year of Rebel revelation in lacrosse. ECHS put past postseason appearances in the rearview mirror and gave Midtown High School (formerly Grady High School) a tussle before falling 17-13 in the opening round of the Class 5A-6A girls state lacrosse championships at Rebel Field.

The Rebels (11-5) finished the spring with their most wins in four seasons and posted their first victory against Richmond Hill. At the end, they proved the postseason stage wasn’t too big.

The Georgia High School Association began sanctioning lacrosse during the 2019-20 school year. Most schools, however, played only a few games in 2020 with the breakout of COVID.

The Rebels began their annual pilgrimage to state in 2021 and lost in the first round to Northview 20-2. The next year, they lost to Westminster 23-1 and last year 16-1 to McIntosh.

This year, Midtown (10-7) scored 13 seconds into the match and held a 4-0 lead midway through the first quarter.

“The first few minutes showed how important taking the ball off the draw would be,” Lawson said. “Whoever controlled the draw, the likelihood (of scoring followed). We tried to be more aggressive and we stepped up as best we could.”

Olivia Morgan, who took the Rebels’ faceoffs, took her game into overdrive. The junior corralled several ground balls off the draw, attacked and began to turn the tide.

In the second quarter, she scored three times – twice only 10 seconds after a Midtown goal. Teammate Megan Coleman added three more goals in the quarter and ECHS erased the four-goal deficit to lead 8-7 at halftime.

Just before the start of the third quarter, a Midtown player yelled to her teammates, “Just remember, we drove four hours to get here.”

Maybe the implication was driving four hours from and back to Atlanta after a loss would be quite a wasted day.

The Knights picked up their play and scored eight goals in the third quarter to regain the lead 15-10 heading into the fourth quarter.

But again ECHS fought back. Morgan scored during a man advantage to make it 15-11. Coleman flicked in another goal 52 seconds later and it was 15-12 with 10:02 left.

Attacker Mackenzie Brown scored with 5:12 to go and Midtown’s lead was trimmed to 15-13, but the Rebels couldn’t get any closer.

“They did play their hearts out,” said Lawson about her players after the game.

Morgan and Coleman both had five goals. Michaela Gordy, Becca Way and Brown tallied single goals.

Ryan Carter had six goals for Midtown. Lilly Taylor, Lexi Fumbanks and Emily Vergara added three apiece.

“After the game I told our girls this team is identical to ours,” Lawson said. “The only difference was they had better placement on the net. They were good at taking shots and getting them around our goalie.

“Our future is bright. We’ll look to recruit (ECHS’ hallway and the middle school) because we’ll lose six seniors. We had a good year but we don’t want to put our sticks down in the offseason. We want to get out there and get our stickwork in. That’s what will take you from making it to the postseason to advancing in the postseason.”

SEHS falls to Decatur

South Effingham’s girls played competitively but fell to Area 6 champion Decatur 15-6 in the opening round of the Class 5A-6A state lacrosse championships on April 24.

The Mustangs (8-6) finished with eight wins, equaling the number of wins they had in four previous seasons combined.

SEHS advanced to the postseason by defeating Evans 9-3 in the regular-season finale. The Mustangs had a key 10-9 double-overtime win over Greenbrier on March 22 which ultimately became the tiebreaker for the fourth and final playoff spot from Area 7.