Harvard Outlasts Bobcat Rally

Harvard women’s lacrosse (4-1) got out to an early lead against Quinnipiac (2-3), then shifted gears to stave off a Bobcat rally in the second half of yesterday’s match at Quinnipiac Lacrosse Turf Field and secure a 13-10 victory.

A trio of hat tricks from junior Kaitlin Martin, sophomore Sara Flood, and freshman Jess Halpern led the charge.

“We always talk about how great it is to go ahead at the start,” co-captain Lauren Bobzin said. “[Martin, Flood, and Halpern] contributed really well at critical moments.”

Senior Natalie Curtis supplied an additional two goals, while classmate Caroline Simmons and junior Shannon Flynn each notched a score.

Martin, Halpern, and Curtis each assisted on three Harvard scores.

Sophomore Katherine Martino came in to mind the net to start the second half, but was pulled in favor of senior starting goaltender Kathryn Tylander after giving up four goals. Tylander had 12 saves.

“I don’t think you can put any one of those goals on [Martino],” Bobzin said. “It was really defensive lapses.”

“We weren’t doing the little things,” Martin added. “We were turning the ball over when trying to move the ball up the field.”

At 4:46 into the starting frame, Flood got the scoring started with a shot past Bobcat goalie Hannah Nelson.

Katie Latonick answered for Quinnipiac off an assist from Ashley Valentine just seven seconds later to draw the score even.

The Crimson rattled off three unanswered goals in three minutes to open a lead, but again the Bobcats cut into that lead with two scores—spread over four minutes—to pull within one, 4-3.

Curtis connected with Martin for another Harvard tally just eight seconds after Quinnipiac’s third goal to open the lead to two with 14:19 remaining in the first half.

The Crimson followed with four unanswered goals—including two free-position shots from Martin and unassisted scores from Curtis and Flynn. Halpern helped Flood to complete her hat trick with two minutes left in the half to polish off the six-goal run, putting Harvard up 10-3 at the half.

Quinnipiac busted out of the gate in the second half when Valentine connected with Meghan Latonick to slip one past Martino just 1:30 into the frame.

The Bobcats continued to test the Crimson’s defense, as Quinnipiac notched four unanswered nets—including three free-position shots—in the first 13 minutes against Martino. The back-up goalkeeper made two stops but made room for starter Tylander to close out the game.

“We recognized that we were falling into a rut,” Martin said. “We got a little complacent and we needed to maintain the intensity.”

Halpern notched an unassisted tally to extend the Harvard lead to 11-7, and that proved to be all the Crimson would need to solidify its fourth win of the season.

Although the Bobcats threatened with two goals at 15:12 and 13:02 and again at 10:12, a pair of Halpern tallies negated the threat and capped off the Harvard victory.

Although only drawing even with Quinnipiac’s 24 shots on goal, the Crimson maintained possession of the ball for much of the remaining 10 minutes of the game to deflect any momentum the Bobcats mustered in the first 20 minutes of the frame.

With its fourth win behind it, Harvard now anticipates its match against Quinnipiac neighbor Connecticut before beginning Ivy League play against Brown on Saturday. But the wins haven’t come easy and the Crimson knows that it has places where it needs to improve.

“Basically, our coach always emphasizes not wins and losses, but how we play the game,” Bobzin said. “Against UConn we’re really going to work on getting back to the basics, controlling the controllables. I’m glad we’ve come out with wins, but we need to be playing better. If we play well, we’re going to win.”

—Staff writer Dixon McPhillips can be reached at fmcphill@fas.harvard.edu.