After cruising through an unbeaten regular season (18-0-1) and winning their third straight Cape Ann League Small title, it would be easy for the Manchester Essex field hockey team to become complacent. But don't count on it with this talented and determined veteran group.

Yesterday the Hornets earned the No. 1 seed in Division 2 North, as the state tournament seedings were released by the MIAA. The seed gives the Hornets one of three first-round byes in the 13-team field.

"As the season went on, that was one of the goals we talked about," said head coach Pam Grant about gaining the top seed.

Manchester Essex opens up in a quarterfinal game on Friday afternoon (2:30 p.m. at Ed Field Field) against the winner of No. 8 Bishop Fenwick against No. 9 Tewksbury, who will play tomorrow night.

With ample time off before the real action starts, Grant scheduled a scrimmage with Division 1 powerhouse Andover yesterday and they'll work on corners with Cape Ann League foe North Andover today.

"We played without three starters against Andover, 45 minutes of 11-on-11 then 7-on-7 and we beat them 1-0," noted Grant.

The 1-0 result was even more impressive given the fact that Andover (17-0-1) is the No. 2 seed in the Division 1 North tournament.

Having a few days off actually works to Manchester Essex's advantage too since a few of their key players have the flu. With any luck, they'll be back to full strength by Friday.

The last few years, Manchester Essex is used to high seeds and long tournament runs — they were No. 2 last fall and lost in the North final to Watertown (2-1 in OT) and in 2007, the Hornets were the top seed and fell to Winchester 3-2 in double-overtime in the North final.

Behind the senior All-League duo of CAL Player of the Year Amelia Cohen (22 goals, 11 assists) and Amelia Burke (24 goals, 17 assists), the Hornets have a potent offense that outscored opponents 78-7. Junior Kyle Marsh (18 goals, 6 assists), an All-Star, was the third-leading scorer in the Cape Ann League while senior Katie Gavin (10 goals, 11 assists) also had a big season offensively.

Junior Patty Wright, an All-League defender and junior goalie Vicki Grimes (12 shutouts) were the main components for the air-tight defense.

If the Hornets win their first game, they'll play the last team standing between Belmont, Wayland, Marblehead and Melrose in the semifinals. In total, there are four CAL teams, three Northeastern Conference teams and Fenwick which is located in Peabody. On the other side of the bracket, No. 2 Watertown (16-0-2) looms while CAL rival Lynnfield (15-2-2) is No. 3.