DENVER — The Castle View defense closed in on Mead lacrosse’s Allie Hartman every time she touched the ball in the Class 4A finals Friday night.
No problem.
The University of Michigan commit simply dished to her slice-and-dice teammate Lucy Connors for one score after another as the Mavericks built a nice lead at Peter Barton Stadium at the University of Denver. Hartman then started scoring, too.
There was just no stopping it.
Connors ended up scoring eight times, often being set up by the 4A player of the year candidate, and Mead — ranked second in these playoffs — beat No. 1 Castle View, 13-5, to usher in a state title in the St. Vrain Valley School District team’s first season as a program.
“Teams don’t know that when they shut me down, I’m also a good feeder,” Hartman said. “When they squeeze in like that and faceguard or cover me a little tighter than usual, I’m still able to find goals — even with assists.”
Fittingly, the Mavericks’ opening opponent to their inaugural season ended up being their last.
In March 9’s season opener, they fell to the Sabercats by one. So Friday night’s final, among other things, was a chance to show all the growth that had happened as a team since that starting point.
And it proved sizable.
“I think we had four team practices before our first game,” Mead coach Katie Coleman Bergmann said. “On our offensive and defensive lineup, we had girls before who hadn’t picked up a lacrosse stick.”
The coach said they knew they’d be OK offensively with the likes of Hartman, Connors and Mia Welty on their scoring front. Defense was the bigger question — and to help, the coach said it became a competition for her defenders to see who could go against Hartman at practice.
“If I can stop Allie at practice, I feel pretty good about my other matchups,” Coleman Bergmann said.
All of it came to fruition by the end.
Connors scored four times on three assists from Hartman in the opening half as the Mavs built a 6-4 lead into the break. The senior-sophomore hookup then accounted for the first two goals in the second and Hartman followed with two goals of her own right after that.
The Mavs (16-2) ended up scoring seven straight before Castle View (17-2) snapped a scoreless drought of 22 minutes, 17 seconds — with 3:30 remaining.
“I love Allie, she is one of my best friends,” said Connors, who was interrupted with Hartman’s chants of “MVP, MVP, MVP” behind her.
“I think when people scout our team, they scout Allie Hartman because she is going to Michigan and is a very, very, very talented player,” said Connors, who noted they she first played alongside Hartman at Fairview last season. “So that leaves holes open for me and other players on my team.”
As the final seconds ticked away, it was appropriate that Hartman had the ball last.
In the semifinals, the Silver Creek student, who her coach calls a “generational player”, scored the winner with just five seconds remaining to beat Evergreen. The year before, she and Connors were on the wrong end of a tight semifinals loss to Valor Christian.
“It feels so good,” said Hartman, who’d flung her stick overhead in celebration as time expired. “You can never win for the first time ever again. We did it.”
