The Parkland girls lacrosse team seems to always step up when it matters most. The Trojans flexed their muscles and started fast right out of the gate in scoring the game’s first eight goals, then held on to defeat Easton 12-9 last Wednesday night at DeSales University in the District 11 Class 3A championship game.

It is the fourth consecutive district title for the Trojans, who also beat the Red Rovers in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference final.

“There’s a lot of pressure during your senior year because you want to keep that legacy going that your former teammates have built for you,” said Parkland senior midfielder Kenzie Roth. “It feels amazing that we can honor our old teammates and keep up the legacy.”

Parkland (15-7) did just what it needed to do by taking an early lead and putting Easton (15-5) in a hole that it would be forced to climb out of. Within the first 20 minutes of the game, the Trojans had scored eight unanswered goals to take an early commanding lead. They led 8-1 at the intermission after the Red Rovers posted their first goal with 1:40 to go before halftime.

“We’ve come out with a fire in us that we’ve never had before really,” Roth said. “We just came out so strong. That’s why we were so successful. We were relentless. I think that kind of took them back a little bit. I don’t think they were expecting that.”

Roth found the back of the net once and was one of six Parkland players to score, including three that netted double-digit tallies. Maeve Leonzi led the way with a team-high four goals, followed by Kaz Kennedy with three and Morgan Hurd with two. Jill Bushinsky and Emily Leiby each recorded a goal. Hurd and Leiby both had two assists.

But the second half was a different story. Whether it was Parkland becoming complacent or Easton getting motivated at halftime, the e game became more nail-biting.

After Hurd scored with 17:49 remaining to put the score at 11-2 in favor of the Trojans, the Red Rovers went on a 7-1 run before the final whistle blew on their comeback effort.

“I thought we started getting too comfortable, being up by that much,” Roth said. “We shouldn’t have been playing that laid back. We had a timeout. We were a little nervous, but our coaches told us to settle down and we handled it. We realized that we needed to keep pushing.”

Kenzie Galucy made seven saves in the win.