MARYSVILLE — The Tomahawks hacked their way to a 3-2 Wesco Conference win against Snohomish Oct. 27.

The hacking wasn’t so much on the field as it was on the bench, as sickness forced Marysville-Pilchuck coach Gary Riozzi to rotate his players every few minutes to rest almost his entire team.

“I had to switch players in and out and that means that we had to put some girls in positions that they weren’t used to,” Riozzi said.

All of the substitutions resulted in a difficult time maintaining possession in the first half. For the first 40 minutes, Snohomish looked to have the advantage, outshooting M-P 5-1, but it only took one shot for the Tomahawks to score.

A long throw in by Mady Schoonover from about the 35-yard line skipped through the Panthers’ back line — all the way to the other side of the goal and to about five yards from goal. Running onto the pass was Melissa Kirk who was able to fight a defender off her hip and tap it in.

“We slipped on in that first half and that sort of woke us up,” Riozzi said.

Whether it was getting a little extra rest — or the cathartic effects of scoring — but the Tomahawks looked like a healthy team for most of the second half. The M-P attack resulted in a Danielle Norton goal in the 58th minute on a through ball from senior Kiely Cordon. Norton outran the Snohomish back line to the ball on the ground, giving her a one-on-one situation. She bested a sliding Panthers keeper Ashley Holten, putting the ball just under her hands from about 10 yards out.

Snohomish responded with a goal on a perfectly placed shot from the edge of the 18-yard box that floated across the goal mouth, rebounding off the far post and in.

“I think we got a little complacent with the two-goal lead, or maybe it was just that we were exhausted,” Riozzi said.

Rachel Hamelin hammered in the eventual game-winning goal in the 66th minute stemming from a corner kick.

Snohomish added another goal to make it interesting, but was not able to find an equalizer, catapulting M-P (7-7-1) into fourth place with 22 points, just past Snohomish’s 21.

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