Bear Bryant is credited with the quote: “Offense sells tickets, but defense wins championships.”

Senior goalie Mikayla Bridges is the final line of defense for the girls’ varsity field hockey team and has made several key plays to lead the Pirates (15-6) to success this season.

After losing the season opener, the Pirates won 10 of their final 11 regular season games, giving up just six goals in those contests.

Making plenty of those stops in goal was Bridges, who was named the area’s Defensive Player of the Year.  She was last year’s runner-up for Goalie of the Year after being snubbed by only 1 vote.

“It was great,” Bridges said when talking about her award. “I didn’t think I was playing that well this year, but when I heard about my stats, I was surprised.”

The Pirates earned a bye in the play-in round as the No. 13 seed in the 40th Annual St. Louis Field Hockey Association Midwest Tournament.

Against Parkway South in the First Round on Oct. 25, nothing was different with the score as the Pirates recorded another shutout and the lone goal by Serena Taylor was enough to defeat the Patriots 1-0.

In the Round of 16 on Saturday, Oct. 27, Pattonville was knocked out of the 30-team tournament by the fourth-seeded Kirkwood Pioneers who won the game with the final score of 2-0.