It was a win-win for the Newtown High School field hockey team in the last regular-season home game, a 2-1 victory over Weston at Blue & Gold Stadium on October 4. In addition to coming out on top the Nighthawks raised money for the American Cancer Society through raffles and other efforts in the stands. On the field the Nighthawks wore special pink uniforms in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Cancer survivor Sue Lagan, mom of team member Jenna Lagan, was recognized for an honorary coin flip at the start.

On the field the Nighthawks built a 2-0 lead and held on. Weston had a third quarter goal called off and scored late in the fourth. Newtown’s defense, led by Kayla Locke and Emily O’Neil, held strong and the offense kept possession for much of the time as the clock ticked down.

Ellenoire Schoen, assisted by Francesca Glazer, got things going in the first quarter. Reese Lischuk added to the lead with a tally assisted by Abby Ihlefeld and Rachael Albrecht before halftime. Evelyn Schoen started the play that led to Newtown’s second cage-finder.

Newtown was coming off a 7-0 loss at Fairfield Ludlowe on October 5. Goals have been hard to come by of late with the Hawks held to two or fewer tallies in seven straight contests heading into an October 8 visit to Sheehan of Wallingford.

“Our ball movement up the field is so pretty,” Newtown Coach Megan Goyda said. “We just need to improve circle play.”

Goyda was pleased with her team’s ball movement in the first half against Weston and thought the players did a good job of supporting each other, including double team efforts on defense.

The coach liked what she saw in the Sheehan contest, a 3-0 Nighthawk victory. Albrecht was assisted by Lily Ammerman, Lischuk was assisted by Glazer and Ihlefeld — both in the first quarter — and Ellenoire Schoen scored unassisted in the fourth. Goaltender Riley Alesevich had a great day with some quality saves to earn the shutout. Locke and O’Neil once again were great on defense. Mo Murphy, Ellenoire Schoen, Glazer, and Evelyn Schoen had strong performances in the midfield.

“It was a great game by all, truthfully. We held possession the majority of the time and if we lost possession we fought hard to repossess the ball. It was evident that we wanted it more but in a controlled and composed way that allowed us to put three goals on the board. Our circle positioning looked a lot better [Tuesday night] in comparison to previous games. It’s one of the things we’ve really been paying attention to in practice so to see us applying it in games is important, especially moving into [Wednesday] with another conference game against Brookfield,” said Goyda, referring to a visit to Brookfield on October 10.

Heading into the last three regular-season games the Hawks will look to make strides as they work toward the South-West Conference Tournament. “We need to take every game as it comes and find one thing we can do better so everything gets right by the playoffs,” Goyda said.

Sports Editor Andy Hutchison can be reached at andyh@thebee.com.