Field Hockey falls to Saratoga High School on senior night
Matadors end their last home game against Saratoga with a power outage
Senior Tanisha Pulla tries to maintain possession as a SHS opponent attempts to steal the ball.
October 24, 2021
The Field Hockey team was looking to win the seniors’ last home game in high school on Oct. 22. However, it lost to Saratoga High School 5-0, bringing its overall record to 2-12 and its league record to 0-7. Saratoga scored four goals in the first three quarters and a final goal right before a power outage in the fourth quarter, with the pitch-black field leading to the referees calling the game.
Senior Navarin Pirachai says that despite the team’s history of declining energy towards the end of games, the Matadors maintained their vigor throughout the entire game, especially considering it was senior night.
“We kept the intensity up,” Pirachai said. “We’ve been known to drop the intensity sometimes, but I think we kept it up pretty well.”
With just a handful of minutes left in the fourth quarter, the MVHS campus lost power, leading to a blackout on the field. Senior and captain Charlotte Dingli says that her initial reaction was to use the confusion and darkness as an advantage to score a goal.
“So my first thought was to get the ball, [and to] use this as an opportunity to score,” Dingli said. “[However], I [didn’t] even know [where the ball was].”
Pirachai says that she was not disappointed that the game ended due to an outage — rather, she sees it as a great story she could recount in the future.
“I think this is going to be something that we’re going to talk about for the rest of our lives,” Pirachai said. “And I’m glad [it] happened because it was really funny. Everyone was happy at the end anyways.”
Looking back, Dingli agrees that despite the unexpected outage, the night ended on a positive note with the encouragement of her friends and their handmade cheer signs.
“I actually thought I was going to be really sad,” Dingli said. “Like, I expected myself to cry. But there was just so much support from our team and from the stand, I was just so happy to be there and to be [ending] field hockey with a bang.”
