Falling Short

In a game that came down to the last minute, Fairfield Women’s Lacrosse team just fell short of evening out their season with a 11-10 loss to Lehigh on Tuesday.

The Stags came into the game after a strong 3-1 record coming off the week. The loss puts the Stags at 3-5 overall on the season while the Mountain Hawks improve to 2-4.

“Today kind of stunk because we took a step back from last game [Mount St. Mary’s],” said junior Mary Vallely of the loss. “We don’t want to go backwards. This time of year is the time when we kick in and start being more consistent because we are half way through the season.”

Fairfield got off to a slow start to begin the game, not connecting well with defense and offense. The Stags soon found themselves trailing 6-3 at the end of the first half.

But Amy Neville ’08 started a rally for the Stags opening the second half with a goal. Lehigh and Fairfield went back and forth on goals that put the score at 8-6 mid-way through the half.

It wasn’t enough to hold off the Mountain Hawks as they put in two goals to bring the score to 10-6. But back-to-back goals by Rebecca White followed by a goal from Sarah Masterson ’07 closed the gap to 10-9. Lehigh would score once more followed by a Fairfield goal by Lara Hannigan ’08 with 1:36 left.

But the goals were too few and far between to give the Stags the edge as they fell 11-10.

“We had a lot of opportunities at the beginning of the game that we didn’t capitalize,” said Head Coach Stacey McCue of the Stags out shooting Lehigh 30-24. “Defense at the beginning wasn’t as sharp as it should have been and I think it would have been different game if we had capitalized on those opportunities.”

However, according to McCue, the key is to try and put a full 60 minutes together.

“There are definitely moments of brightness and its just bringing that for an entire 60 minutes,” she said.

But the loss only gets the girls even more fired up, and in some instances is a good thing.

“Losing games like this it almost works in our advantage because now we’re so mad that we lost to them so close that next game were going to come out twice as hard,” said Neville who garnered 15 goals in the past five games. “When we play as a team we are one of the best teams out there. We know were good and it’s about confidence.”

The game against Lehigh was led by Kylee Martin ’09 who netted three goals for the game and one assist. White and Neville also tagged on two goals for the Stags and Hannigan netted her first goal of the season along with two assists.

Lauren Chatnik ’09 minded the goal for a full 60 minutes making 10 saves and allowing 11 goals.

The Stags start their “second-half” of the season this Saturday as they will play their first league game against Marist. And with the first MAAC game approaching the team is more than ready to compete.

“I think that some of the non-league games prepared us for the league,” said Neville. “Now everyone knows how good we are and were going to show them what were capable of.”