Despite some hard losses earlier in the season against Los Gatos (15-5), Mountain View (11-10), and Gunn (14-8), the varsity girls lacrosse team has bounced back.

Since their most recent loss against Mountain View (11-8) on April 18, they came back with wins against Pioneer (13-11), Los Altos (15-7), Saratoga (15-5), Willow Glen (15-2), Wilcox (14-2) and Los Gatos in the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League (SCVAL) semi-finals (7-5). Their only losses were against Los Gatos (12-10), Sacred Heart (18-9) and Gunn (10-9).

The junior varsity team has had an outstanding season as well, winning all of their games with the exception of one tie against Los Gatos.

Members of the varsity team attribute their recent wins to motivation from past losses.

“We have only changed our warm ups and our defensive strategy, otherwise it was really mental. It took awhile for our new team to work together cohesively, but [we’re] at a point where we can connect on the field as long as we go all out.”

Lia Salvatierra, junior

A key player on the team has been Mattie Orloff, the goalie.

“Mattie holds our team together like glue, and we would not be where we are today without her,” said varsity player and freshman Andie Teztlaff in a message.

She also cited midfielder Emma Staiger as a teammate who has “never let [the] team down.”

The team was optimistic for the SCVAL finals against Gunn, the last game of the season.

“We’ve been pushing ourselves hard during practice, and I’m sure it will all pay off on [the SCVAL finals],” Teztlaff said a few days before the SCVAL finals.

While they lost against Gunn (10-9), teammates are pretty happy about the season overall.

“Although [SCVALS are] our last game, this past season has been absolutely amazing, and I have been truly honored to be a part of it,” Teztlaff said. “We’ve had many wins and a couple losses, but we use those losses to push ourselves and motivate each other to get better and fix mistakes so that they won’t happen again.”