By Brandy L. Simms

Sentinel Sports

ROCKVILLE - It was billed as the unofficial county championship game.

The contest featured Montgomery County's only unbeaten teams and when the dust settled Wootton was left standing as the Patriots held off Quince Orchard, 10-7, Saturday to earn a perfect regular season.

"This is the first time I've ever had a season like this," Wootton third-year Head Coach Anne Marie Ritzell said afterward. "We started off and it was like a .500 season and we made improvement over the years but this was unexpected. I didn't think coming into the season it would end up like this at all."

Cornell-bound senior Julie Klatzkin scored five goals to lead Wootton. Quince Orchard, which fell to 10-1, was led by junior Alissa Peterson who finished with four goals on her 17th birthday.

Wootton raced out to a 3-0 lead and built a 5-1 advantage at the half. Klatzkin's goal with 13:55 remaining gave Wootton an 8-3 lead and the Patriots appeared headed for an easy victory but the Cougars would not quit. Three straight free position goals including two by Peterson cut the deficit to 8-6 with 7:15 remaining.

"Throughout the whole season our coach always tells us that if you're up by four goals the game's not over, teams can always come back so we believe in that wholeheartedly," explained Peterson. "We got a couple goals right away, we got some momentum going. We really believed that our game was within our reach and we just took it from there."

The Patriots (12-0) were a dominant force in the county this season, winning their first eight games by an average of nearly nine goals. Besides Klatzkin, the Patriots boast talented senior standouts in Salisbury-bound Carrie Bray, goalie Amelia Titus and Liza Kaplan who scored a hat trick and had an assist against Quince Orchard.

Klatzkin sealed the Patriots' win over Quince Orchard by scoring a pair of goals in the final two minutes. "We don't have experience playing collegiate level players and [Klatzkin] is at that caliber of lacrosse," said Peterson, "and it took us too long to make an adjustment to her."