W. Lacrosse Logs First Ivy Win

A season’s worth of disastrous second halves may have been redeemed on Saturday, as the women’s lacrosse team dominated Columbia 15-7.

The Crimson (6-8, 1-5 Ivy) held the Lions (7-8, 0-7 Ivy) scoreless for 33 minutes that spanned from late in the first half until even later in the second half. During that time Harvard scored eight times, with half of those goals coming from sophomore midfielder Elaine Belitsos.

“Before the game started, we had decided that the first team to get to 10 goals was going to be the victorious team,” said sophomore midfielder Allison Kaveney. “We were in a ‘refuse to lose’ mind set, and there was no way Columbia was going to score 10 goals on our defense.”

Belitsos, who has been a potent weapon for the Crimson on both ends of the field, turned in five goals in Saturday’s game.

“[Belitsos] is all over the field when she out there,” said junior midfielder Casey Owens. “There’s no stopping her. She was really heads up and really focused and she had a lot of great looks and great opportunities.”

An overwhelming defensive performance by Harvard stopped all but one Columbia goal in the second half.

Teammates credited freshman goaltender Kathryn Tylander with holding down the Columbia defense.

“There was great direction and leadership from Tylander,” said junior attackman Catherine Sproul, who managed two goals yesterday. “She’s really a source of strength for the defense. They stepped up their communication, stopped fouling and just played really tough D.”

The Crimson’s offensive storm included goals from six different players and hat tricks from Owens and senior midfielder Jen Brooks.

“We were just ready to go,” Owens said. “We weren’t going to take no for an answer. We knew it was a must win situation.”

After trading goals through most of the first half, Lions senior midfielder Maggie Via slipped a shot into the Harvard net to put her team ahead 6-5, with 5:32 left in the half. It would be the last Columbia goal for a while, though. A minute and a half later, Belitsos found the back of the net off assist from freshman midfielder Caroline Hines to tie the score.

Belitsos was back several minutes later to score again with just five seconds remaining in the half.

The Crimson run continued into the second half with Sproul turning in her second goal of the day after just 2:18, off an assist from Brooks. It would be the last goal for either team for 12 minutes.

The opening minutes of the game appeared to foreshadow a slugfest.

Owens garnered the first tally of the game with an unassisted goal just 37 seconds in.

Her goal was answered less than a minute later by a goal from Columbia freshman attack Kate Lombard.

At 3:03, Sproul turned in a goal off an assist from freshman attack Margaret Yellot to regain the lead for Harvard.

Yellot, who has been a lynchpin of the Crimson offense all season had a relatively quiet game, with just one assist and one shot on goal.

Columbia came charging right back just 34 seconds later to tie the score again at 2-2.

Shining for the Lions in the first half was senior attack Adie Moll, who turned in a hat-trick between 18:02 and 19:59, with two goals just 36 seconds apart off assists from sophomore midfielder Carrie Anderer. Her last goal pushed Columbia to a 5-4 lead.

Belitsos, Brooks and Owens each scored twice in the first half.

After a relative drought early in the second half, Harvard picked up where it had left off with a Belitsos goal off an Owens assist 24:14 into the second half to set the score at 9-6.

Fifty-three seconds later Brooks found the back of the net, and 1:23 after that freshman attack scored off an assist from Kaveney.

Five minutes later Belitsos capped off the Crimson run with another goal.

By that point the score stood at 13-6.

Harvard’s dominance was interrupted only once in the second half by a free position goal by Lions freshman midfielder Elyse Pultz.

Harvard capped its coup with two free position goals by Belitsos and freshman attack Perry Barlow in the last 2:30 of the game.

Discussing the Crimson’s run in the second half, Sproul suggested that the lopsided performance may have happened because the team was not playing at full speed in the first half.

“I think we coming into the game we may not have been as fired up as we had been,” she said. “We recognized what we were doing wrong at halftime and we were able to collect it for the second half effectively.”

Harvard faces its last opponent of the season, Cornell, this Saturday at home.

Team members say they are looking to this game as a real test of what their team can do.

Pointing out that the Big Red only defeated Columbia by two points, Sproul said she was optimistic about the Crimson’s chances.

“We haven’t beaten them in a couple of years and this sets us up for a chance to show them that our program is right up there with theirs,” she said.

—Staff writer Nathaniel A. Smith can be reached at nsmith@fas.harvard.edu.