Wissahickon outlasts Hatboro-Horsham in thriller

LOWER GWYNEDD — It was a milestone scoring night for Emily Vervlied, but it was a pass she made that rang a bit louder.

Vervlied’s assist to Marie Dickson with 4:28 left provided the game-winning score in a 14-12 Suburban One League American Conference thriller against Hatboro-Horsham on the Trojans’ Senior Night Monday.

Vervlied also scored her 100th career goal in the first half, part of a three goal and two assist night for the sophomore.

“I saw two defenders coming to me and they left her open in the middle,’ Vervlied said. “I passed it right away to see if she could get the shot off and she did.’

Wissahickon held firm early as senior goalie Julie Silverman made three point-blank saves to deny the Hatters. Those blocks played a key role as her offense started to settle in over the opening eight minutes.

Finally, the Wissahickon offense got going, spurred on by a few chances at free position shots. Emily Vervlied opened the scoring, followed by a quick double by Carolyn Wilde and a nice tally by Marie Dickson off her own miss to go up 4-0.

“The same thing they had in the first few minutes we got, it was all about possession,’ Hatters coach Duncan Swezey said. “Whoever had the ball, you could score when you had the ball so once the possessions turned our way, that got spun around.’

While the Hatters were reeling, they found a quick answer when Carly Daley scored on a free position shot. The calm wouldn’t last long as Shannon Stagliano played a pass from behind the net to Vervlied. Vervlied put on a spin then fired the ball in for her 100th high school goal.

“I knew about it but I didn’t want to think only about that because I knew if I wasn’t going to get it I wasn’t going to and I didn’t want to force it,’ Vervlied said. “All my teammates came over to celebrate with me so it was really special.'”I wanted to get that for her because even though we didn’t want to get distracted by the 100th goal, we wanted her to get it right at the start of the game,’ Stagliano, a junior midfielder, said.