No 17. Dartmouth Sends Harvard Packing

Playing six ranked teams in seven games is no easy feat, and the Harvard women’s lacrosse team knows it all too well.

However, the Crimson offense finally came together last night, scoring ten goals after five games stuck in the single digits.

Unfortunately for Harvard, Dartmouth’s offense also had a banner game, and ten points were not enough for a victory on Scully-Fahey Field in Hanover, N.H.

The Big Green (8-4, 4-2 Ivy) took the game 20-10 as the Crimson (2-10, 0-4 Ivy) lost its seventh straight.

While Dartmouth’s offense is undoubtedly potent—it has averaged nearly 15 points per game over the past six contests—one factor in particular made a decisive difference in its most recent win : winning draws.

The Big Green dominated the draws and ended up controlling the ball for the majority of the first half.

“Draw control was the big difference in the game,” sophomore attack Kaitlin Martin said. “Their offense had the ball more than our offense did.”

That simple draw advantage meant more shot opportunities for Dartmouth. The Big Green had a whopping 20-shot advantage as it threw 35 at the net to the Crimson’s 15.

A slow start from Harvard let Dartmouth grab a 4-0 lead ten minutes into the contest, and the Big Green never looked back.

Junior attack Tara Schoen kept Harvard in the game for the first 13 minutes of the matchup, and her natural hat trick kept Dartmouth from increasing their four-goal advantage until halfway through the first period.

However, the Big Green’s Jen Pittman won 23 of 32 faceoffs, including seven of eight at the end of the first half.

Those extra possessions were the X-factor in the final minutes and allowed Dartmouth to close out the half on a 5-1 run, ending the period with a score of 14-5.

The Crimson showed its resilience by winning the first two draws of the second half, but, at that point, the rolling Big Green offense was going too fast to stop. After the first few minutes of the half, Dartmouth hit a 4-0 run that gave them a more-than-comfortable 18-5 lead.

The game was not nearly over for Harvard, though, and hard-nosed defensive play paired with a newly sparked offense pushed the Crimson to a 5-2 scoring streak to finish the game.

Martin and sophomore midfielder Sarah Bancroft each had two goals in the last 15 minutes to close out the strong half.

“We started playing really, really well at the end of the game,” Martin said. “We just have to come out in every single game like that.”

Despite Harvard’s double-digit deficit at the final whistle, the Crimson felt that the level of play was not as lopsided as the score might indicate.

“[Dartmouth was] just a really quick team and had some really good accurate shots,” junior attack Caroline Simmons said. “They really worked together well and always found the open player—but our defense did a really good job of sliding and marking the cutters. They had some really strong one-on-one players.”

Big Green junior Kristen Barry was one of those strong players.

Matching a career high with six goals, Barry overshadowed the Crimson’s Schoen, who had an impressive five scores to lead Harvard.

After playing three road games in a row, the Crimson will return to Harvard Stadium this Saturday afternoon still looking for its first league win. Its opponent, Columbia, is coming off of a 13-8 win over Lehigh yesterday.

“Saturday is a must-win,” Martin said. “We need to beat Columbia. We can beat Columbia. There’s no reason we shouldn’t.”