The postseason got underway with South-West Conference tournament action on the tennis courts, on May 18, and now the rest of Newtown High School’s teams will get going in the playoffs.

On the lacrosse field, the NHS boys’ squad earned the SWC Division I tourney’s No. 4 seed and a quarterfinal-round home game. Fifth-seeded Weston visits Blue & Gold Stadium on Thursday, May 21, for a 6 pm battle. Newtown earned a 10-3 win at Weston in a regular-season game, on April 28. The winner of this contest advances to take on top-seeded New Milford in the semifinals, scheduled for Tuesday, May 26, at Brookfield High, beginning at 7 pm. The championship game will be played at Joel Barlow in Redding, and is set for Thursday, May 28, also at 7 pm.

Newtown High’s girls’ lacrosse team narrowly missed qualifying for the conference playoffs. The Hawks needed one of two things to happen, on May 19, to qualify for the tournament. Both nearly did, but neither fell into place. The Nighthawks came up just short of upsetting host Joel Barlow of Redding, falling 11-10; and Bethel, which lost to Newtown last week, managed an 11-10 overtime upset of Weston to climb into the six-team playoff with its second conference win of the spring. Newtown finished the year with a record of 5-11 overall, and 1-5 in SWC action. Against a 13-win Barlow team, the Nighthawks put forth quite an effort. Kat Jennings led the Hawks with five goals, Lauren Carrino and Julia Shugrue both had two, and Brianna Sclafani added one. Julia Wiberg had eight draw controls.

Softball playoffs get started with eighth-seeded Notre Dame-Fairfield visiting top-seeded Newtown High for a quarterfinal-round contest on Friday, May 22, for a 4 pm first pitch. The winner plays in the semifinals, at Stratford’s DeLuca Field, on May 26, at 7 pm. The softball championship game is scheduled for the next night, also at DeLuca, at 7 pm. Newtown defeated Notre Dame 7-4 in a regular-season matchup earlier this month.

On the baseball diamonds, the Nighthawks will begin postseason competition on Saturday, May 23, with a visit to Bunnell of Stratford for a quarterfinal-round clash; first pitch is at 2 pm. Newtown and Bunnell both went 9-4 in conference play but, by virtue of tiebreakers, the Bulldogs earned the third seed, and the Hawks are placed sixth. The winner advances to the May 26 semifinals, which will take place at Bethel High, at 4 or 7 pm; the title game is slated for Wednesday, May 27, also at Bethel, at 7 pm. The Hawks doubled up Bunnell in a late-April meeting.

The track and field championships are to take place at Weston High on May 26, beginning at 4 pm. And the boys’ and girls’ golf championships will take place May 29 and June 2, at Ridgewood Country Club in Danbury, and Orange Hills Country Club, respectively.

The girls' tennis team was beaten 7-0 by visiting Weston, and the boys went to Pomperaug of Southbury, and dropped a 5-2 decision. The playoffs continue for these squads with individual tourney action, May 26 and 27; the girls play at Barlow and the boys' bracket will unfold at Immacualte High in Danbury.

Check back for tournament highlights, and open the May 29 print edition of The Bee for more postseason coverage.