The Londonderry High School Field Hockey team had its eighth straight victory over the weekend in Derry with a close 4-3 win over Pinkerton Academy during the annual Mack Plaque contest despite losing one of their key players to injury earlier in the day.
The now 9-0 Lancers squad had two, one-point victories last week, beating the Exeter Blue Hawks 3-2 to start the week, followed by a 6-0 win over Nashua North and ended the week with the tight win over the Astros.
Londonderry hosted the Blue Hawks on Monday afternoon, Sept. 22, where they successfully held off the now 4-6 Exeter squad for their seventh victory.
Junior Lexi Padykula started the scoring with the assist going to sophomore Morgan Ayotte.
Senior Lindsey McKinnon and junior Gemma Murray also scored for the tying and go-ahead goals.
Two days later, in the home game against the winless Nashua North Titans, Londonderry kept the streak going with a six-goal shutout victory with goals coming from three different players.
Senior Alison Chambers put in two to start the scoring with senior Eras Delorey getting an assist on one of them.
Other goals went to Delorey, Ayotte (2) and sophomore Ashleigh Minahan.
Freshman Emma Karvielis had the assist with both of the Ayotte goals and junior Avery Callahan assisted Minahan on her tally.
In the game against Pinkerton Academy, in Derry on Friday afternoon, after getting off to a very quick lead early, Londonderry held off an Astros charge for a one-goal advantage and a 4-3 Mack Plaque victory.
They did this despite the loss of senior Eres Delorey, who was sidelined due to an injury sustained earlier in the day at the Pep Rally.
Padykula scored inside the first minute of action assisted by Ayotte.
At the six-minute mark of the first quarter, junior Sadie Moore made it 2-0 with an assist from Chambers.
The Astros were able to get on the board, making it a 2-1 game when Ayotte scored the first of her two goals at 10:00 in the second period assisted by Padykula.
In the sixth-minute of that period PA brought the score back to within one goal followed by another Astros goal to knot the game at three per side.
In the 14:18 fourth, Ayotte got her second goal of the game assisted this time by Chambers, resulting in the win.
The LHS defense was able to stave off the tough PA offense throughout the remainder of the game to retain the their undefeated status.
The Lancers have seven games left to the regular season and were scheduled to meet two tough opponents this week.
On Monday, Sept. 29, they faced the 7-1-1 Winnacunnet Warriors at home followed by a trip to Timberlane Regional High School on Thursday Oct. 1 to take on the 6-3 Owls.