SACRAMENTO, Calif. – Sophomore Piper Brostrom scored a game-high four goals while Miranda Ferguson added three goals and two assists, but St. Francis surrendered three goals in the final 96 seconds to fall by a 11-9 final to El Camino in the CK McClatchy Junior Varsity Season Opener fifth/sixth-place game Saturday.
The Troubadours opened the day with an 11-6 loss to Granite Bay, then edged Rocklin by a 6-5 score in the consolation bracket semifinal before falling to the Eagles.
Brostrom led all SFHS players with seven goals in the three games, while Havana Sperber added six and Ferguson contributed five goals in five total dimes. Freshman goalie Holland Sperber notched 15 saves for the day. Mary Margaret Ferrara chipped in two goals and freshman Hattie Hastings netted her first score as a Troubie.
St. Francis and El Camino battled to a total of eight ties in the placing game, the seventh of which came on a Brostrom score soon after the opening sprint in the fourth frame. She stole the ball past the mid-tank marker in Eagle territory, and outworked the EC defender on her way to the cage, equalizing at 8-8. Holland Sperber came up with a couple of saves while sophomore center Addison Hutchcraft posted a clutch steal to halt what seemed like an easy Eagle counterattack midway through the quarter.
With 2:02 remaining, Brostrom scored her fourth goal on another fast break to lift the Troubies to a 9-8 lead. However, El Camino scored three unanswered down the final stretch: one from two meters, another on a bar-in from the perimeter, then the insurance goal from the one spot with 13 ticks left.
The loss to the Eagles followed the Troubies' thrilling victory over Rocklin in the mid-afternoon tilt. The two teams battled to a 2-2 impasse at halftime, with Ferrara and Havana Sperber scoring goals within a minute's span late in the first quarter. The older Sperber, Brostrom and Frances Wells each managed shots in the second quarter but Rocklin goalie Kaniya Destin-Driver kept the net clear. Destin-Driver also stopped Hutchcraft's 6-on-5 attempt to start the third before Hastings put SF back on top thanks to a Ferguson assist.
Hastings' goal began a run of three straight in the third frame, with Ferguson feeding Brostrom and a counterattack goal then scoring on her own from a Hutchcraft assist with 0:54 left. This put the Troubies up by a 5-2 margin through three, only to see that cushion wither to a single goal when Claire Wuelfing and Taylor Humbert found the back of the cage in the fourth.
The Sperber sisters combined on key heroics in the final minute of the game: Holland making a lunging save, then Havana finishing the ensuing drive the other way, bringing the score to 6-4 with 47 seconds remaining. Wuelfing scored again with eight seconds left to bring the Thunder within one, but no Rocklin player challenged for possession after the subsequent restart. The ball quickly went back to Holland Sperber, who dutifully ran out the clock.
Granite Bay led wire-to-wire in Saturday's opener, with Lucy Nihart scoring four goals in 6-2 Grizzly start. St. Francis rallied to wishing a 6-5 deficit, starting with a power-play chance in the final seconds before halftime. Ferrara drew the exclusion, then assisted Ferguson for the goal. Brostrom scored off her winning sprint to start the third, then assisted Havana Sperber just 33 seconds later. But Nihart scored her fifth and Sophia Manke hit back-to-back as GB pulled away to the win.
The CKM Season Opener featured eight teams, with all games playing with modified rules, including a five-minute quarter. The Troubies return to action on Tuesday for a rematch with GB. The varsity will play at 6 p.m. followed by the JV at 7 p.m. The SF jayvees then return to Gold Rush country that weekend for the GB tournament.
