Sports
Despite loss to No. 9 Tufts, women’s lacrosse team still hoping for NCAA Championship bid
By Patrick Malin ’18
May 1, 2015
The women’s lacrosse season came to an end this past weekend with the team falling in the first round of the NESCAC playoffs. The Continentals faced an elite Tufts team in the quarterfinals, in a game that came down to the last minute of play. The Continentals had an outstanding regular season and with many key pieces returning, will look to retool and make a deep run in the playoffs next season.
The team gain ed momentum at the end of a very impressive regular season heading into the NESCAC playoffs. On April 15, the women’s team traveled to Connecticut to take on the NESCAC team with the worst record, Connecticut College. Margaret Gabriel ’16 put on a clinic, scoring four goals to lead the team to a 12-6 dominant victory. Nora Klemmer ’17, Ashleigh Stephan ’15 and Taylor Ryan ’17 all added two goals, and Hattie Duke ’18 and Darby Philbrick ’18 scored a goal each. Goalie Hannah Rubin ’17 along with the strong defense by the Continentals helped limit Connecticut College to just 14 shots.
A week later, the women’s lacrosse team finished the regular season with an 8-9 loss against Ithaca. Hamilton outscored Ithaca 6-3 in the first half, but could not hold them off in the second half, allowing six goals and only adding two of their own. Caroline McCarthy ’16 scored a hat trick, and Duke, Stephan, Klemmer, Philbrick and Ryan scored a goal each, but the Continentals could not score a clutch goal to level the score late in the game.
In the quarterfinals of the NESCAC playoffs at Steuben Field, Hamilton took on a Tufts team that finished the regular season with the same record as the Continentals. The Jumbos struck first, scoring just over two minutes into the game. The Continentals did not wait to retaliate, capitalizing on a Tufts turnover that led to a goal by Gabriel. Tufts stormed back and grabbed a 3-1 lead, but free-position shot goals by Stephan and Ryan narrowed the margin to 4-3 in favor of Tufts at halftime.
After conceding two early goals in the second half, Morgan Fletcher ’17 and Philbrick were able to score goals for the Continentals to bring the score to 6-5 halfway through the second half. With 15:39 left in the game, Tufts scored what turned out to be the game winning goal from a free-position shot. Gabriel was able to score her second goal of the game to cut the Tufts lead to one goal, but the Continentals could not come up with the equalizing goal in the last ten minutes, falling to Tufts 7-6 and getting eliminated from the postseason.
The women’s lacrosse team finished with an overall 11-5 record, with an impressive NESCAC record of 7-3. Next year, the Continentals will be without Stephan, who scored 21 goals and provided senior leadership for the successful 2015 spring season.
There are, however, many leading point-scorers who will be returning, and expectations for next season are already very high. Fletcher led the team with 33 points, scoring a team leading 27 goals along with six assists. Gabriel had a team high eight assists and tallied 17 goals on the season and McCarthy ended with 27 total points (22 goals, 5 assists). Promising freshman Philbrick scored 12 goals in her first season at Hamilton.
Despite the loss, the women are still holding out for an NCAA Championship bid. With the NESCAC championships wrapping up this weekend, the Continentals will be waiting with bated breath this coming Sunday to see if they have a shot to compete for a National Championship.