Women's Lacrosse Splits Weekend to Open Season

The Harvard women’s lacrosse team (1-1) opened its 2014 campaign with a pair of games on the West Coast.

The Crimson suffered a 14-10 loss to Stanford (2-0) on Saturday, but the team rallied back on Sunday to defeat St. Mary’s (0-2), 18-7, and end the weekend with an even slate.

The Crimson’s offense was paced by a handful of freshmen, which combined for 17 of the team’s 28 total goals on the weekend. Freshman attacker Marisa Romeo led the group with seven goals between the two games.

HARVARD 18, ST. MARY'S 7

With three goals in the first three minutes of the game, the Crimson took no time bouncing back from Saturday’s loss. The team built on this early and commanding lead en route to an 18-7 rout of the Gaels on Sunday afternoon.

“We were really looking for redemption after the loss yesterday,” Romeo said. “A lot of our experience from then made us jump right out and take that aggression out in the opening minutes.”

After the Gaels cut the lead to 3-1, Harvard responded as Romeo and classmate Megan Hennessey both found the back of the net to extend the Crimson lead to four.

This pair of freshman attackers spearheaded the Harvard offense, as Hennessey tallied five goals and two assists in the game, and Romeo added another four goals and two assists.

The Crimson kept command of the game and closed out the first period, 11-4, with its greatest lead of the day to that point.

Harvard maintained the advantage by scoring the first two goals of the second period. After the Crimson and St. Mary’s exchanged two goals apiece, Harvard gained a double-digit lead with a goal by Romeo to make it 16-6. Goals by sophomore defenseman Carolyn Bruckmann and senior attacker Chloe Soukas gave the Crimson a twelve-point advantage, 18-6, with just under seven minutes to play. In the final minutes, Harvard held the Gaels to a single goal to seal the victory.

“We were really staying with our set offense, which is a lot of movement and passing,” Romeo said. “So girls were getting open and we were able to share the scoring.”

The Crimson took 47 shots in the game, more than double the 20 taken by the Gaels. St. Mary’s goalie, Sydney Pinello, kept the Gaels in the game by turning over 18 of those shots.

Turnovers proved costly as St. Mary’s squandered the ball 26 times to give the Crimson the opportunity to extend its early lead.

STANFORD 14, HARVARD 10

Although the Crimson outscored the Cardinals, 8-7, in the second half, it was not enough to overcome an early deficit.

Stanford had Harvard on its heels early with four unanswered goals in the first ten minutes of the game. Sophomore attacker Alexis Nicolia responded with two goals for the Crimson to cut the Cardinals lead in half. Stanford soon regained the advantage and closed out the first period with an 8-3 lead.

Nicolia and Romeo combined for six goals to pace the Crimson offense. Rookie midfielder Maeve McMahon also contributed a goal, collecting two ground balls, and adding a draw control.

Early in the second period, the Cardinals buried the Crimson with four goals in succession to take a commanding 12-4 lead.

“I thought Stanford [was] really physical and they pushed us off the ball,” Harvard coach Lisa Miller said. “I think that we had to adapt to that before we could start putting points on the board.… Then we settled down, and we started to chip away. But you can’t give that kind of lead to a good team and expect to come back.”

Trailing by eight with just 17 minutes left to play, the Crimson captured the momentum by tallying four consecutive goals. Stanford sophomore attacker Meg Lentz retaliated and scored her fourth and final goal with 9:13 left in the game to halt Harvard’s run and increase the Cardinals’ lead to five. Two late Crimson goals were not enough to close the distance, as Stanford held on to close out the win, 14-10.

Coming off an impressive freshman campaign, sophomore goalie Kelly Weis anchored the Crimson’s defense with nine saves. This was not enough to fend off a strong Cardinals’ offense, which outshot the Crimson 31-21 on the afternoon.

“I’m actually not disheartened by this game at all,” Miller said. “I know [my players] were a little disappointed in themselves. But I feel like this is a learning experience, and we’re going to get better from it.”