May 24, 2013 2 min read

The Peters Township girls lacrosse team successfully defended its WPIAL Division I title with a 16-14 victory over Shady Side Academy late Thursday night at North Hills High School.

“I know how great it felt doing this last year,” senior goalie Mel Morgret said. “It feels even better doing it as a senior.”

No. 2 Peters Township (17-2), which, in addition to last year, won three straight titles from 2007-09, will play the third seed from District 3 in the first round of the PIAA playoffs Wednesday.

Shady Side Academy, the top seed of the WPIAL draw, will play either the District 6 or District 10 champion.

Shady Side Academy (15-2) drew to within one at 14-13 on a goal from K.K. Jaffe, but Sarah Bootman scored her 200th career goal off an assist from Hannah Wilcox (four goals) to keep Peters Township in front.

Bootman, Caitlin Carey and Allison Hurley all had hat tricks for Peters Township. Stanford recruit Felicia Tissenbaum scored six goals for Shady Side Academy, which scored three goals in less than a minute for that 14-13 score.

Peters Township advanced to the championship game with a 20-8 win over Sewickley Academy in the quarterfinals, and the Indians topped Pine-Richland, 12-10, to reach the Division I final.

Shady Side Academy beat Quaker Valley (9-8) and Mt. Lebanon (9-7). Shady Side’s only two losses this season were to Peters Township, which beat Shady Side, 19-12, April 2.

Peters Township took a 13-9 lead at the half behind four goals from Hannah Wilcox, who also had two assists and now has 207 career goals. The Indians scored five consecutive times for a 7-3 lead, then four straight goals made it 13-6.

Angela Esposito and Morgret shared time in goal for Peters Township, and the shots were tied at 25 apiece