Submitted Photo Gowanda won its first-ever Section VI girls lacrosse championship Friday when the Panthers beat Eden 17-8 in the Class D title game.

GOWANDA — As graduating seniors, Miya Scanlan and Scotia Snyder had already left their individual marks on the Gowanda girls lacrosse program.

Friday, they had their chance to cement their legacies.

Scanlan wasted no time in doing so.

The Jacksonville University-bound attack won the opening faceoff, went down the field and almost immediately scored a goal and the Panthers never looked back en route to a 17-8 victory over Eden in the Section VI Class D championship game Friday morning.

“She set the tone for the game,” first-year Gowanda head coach Lottie Gill said Friday evening. “We split with them during the regular season. It was a lopsided win for us at home and it was lopsided the other way at Eden.”

Gowanda led 12-4 by halftime en route to finally getting over the hump against the Raiders for the program’s first sectional title. Eden had beaten the Panthers in the 2018 and 2019 finals before last season was wiped out by COVID-19.

“I truly did believe that our team was the better team. After our loss (at Eden) we just wanted to finish the regular season strong. Every practice I would tell them ‘you are the better team. You need to dominate and take over,'” Gill said. “They definitely did that. We had a really good practice Thursday. I had picked up on some of Eden’s tendencies and we were able to counter that today.”

Scanlan — who eclipsed 200 career goals earlier this season — finished with five goals and two assists while her counterpart Scotia Snyder — herself committed to Coastal Carolina University — scored six goals.

“Miya did fantastic. She was very dominant off the draw,” Gill said. “She’s a great player.”

Chloe Luther chipped in six goals and one assist.

For the season, Scanlan finished with 62 goals and 32 assists for 94 points while Snyder added 50 goals and 18 assists for 68 points.

With those two as well as Cecelia Young, Irissa Loving and Shon Thompson graduating, it will be up to Gowanda’s younger players to defend the title next spring.

“The pressure was definitely there to win a sectional title,” said Gill, work works in support services for Native American students at Gowanda’s middle school. “It was the third straight time against Eden. They fell short in 2019 and 2018.

“There was definitely some pressure on the seniors,” Gill said. “It was now or never.”