On October 24, after waiting a full week, and playing two games, Newtown High School’s field hockey team finally finished its Senior Night game with Immaculate of Danbury after the October 17 contest was halted due to lightning in the area. The teams picked up where they left off, in a 1-1 tie during the second quarter, and after regulation had to wait even longer to finalize things. The game went into 7 on 7, open field overtime and the visiting Mustangs prevailed for a 2-1 victory at Blue & Gold Stadium.

“It was very unusual, I feel like we were a little off our game because of the unusual circumstances,” said Newtown’s Jules Battaglia, whose team won 2-1 at Joel Barlow of Redding on Oct 19 then fell 7-0 at FCIAC foe Greenwich two days later. Against Barlow, Rachael Albrecht scored first goal and Reese Lischuk the second. Summer Harrell assisted both tallies.

Against Immaculate, Newtown goaltender Riley Alesevich made a few stops and the defense, led by Brooke Bulkley, Jules Battaglia, Jenna Lagan, Nella Walsh, and Mo Murphy did well to limit Immaculate’s chances, including stopping the Mustangs on several of their late-game penalty corner opportunities. The Mustangs had nine corners in the game and Newtown had seven.

The Nighthawk midfield and offense, led by Abby Ihlefeld, Alison Powers, Shannon Hegarty, Lischuk, Harrell, and Albrecht applied pressure, and Ellenoire Schoen helped create penalty corners.

Newtown Coach John Savage reflected on what the Nighthawk players indicated were areas in which they needed to improve at halftime and said passing, positioning, shot placement, and not capitalizing on chances, then not making necessary adjustments in the second half, cost the team a victory.

Despite that, overall winning ways in the conference set up the Hawks with a first round South-West Conference tournament home game against Brookfield on Thursday, October 27 at 6 pm. Newtown defeated Brookfield 3-2 during the regular season. The Nighthawks earned the SWC’s No. 3 seed and Brookfield is the No. 6 team.

“I think everyone’s super excited,” said Battaglia, adding that the seniors are looking to go out strong in their last season.

Sports Editor Andy Hutchison can be reached at andyh@thebee.com.