No. 6 Florida rolled to a comfortable win against Setson in the Gators' fourth straight road game to open the season, providing the lone win for the American Athletic Conference in three games Saturday.
NO. 6 FLORIDA 19, STETSON 7
DELAND, Fla. – The high-powered offensive attack of the sixth-ranked Florida lacrosse team led them past the Stetson Hatters 19-7 on Saturday afternoon.
The Gators move to 3-1 on the year, while Stetson drops to 0-2.
Florida had 11 different players score on Saturday afternoon, led by five goals from Shannon Kavanagh – a season-best mark. Ashley Gonzalez followed with a career-high three goals of her own, securing the first hat trick of her career.
Maggi Hall and Paisley Eagan tallied two goals apiece on the afternoon, while Liz Harrison, Emily Heller, Danielle Pavinelli, Grace Haus, Shelton Sawers, Janine Suris and Kaitlyn Dabkowski each pitched in one goal. Harrison and Suris both registered their first career goals in the game.
Brianna Harris posted three assists in the game, while Harrison and Pavinelli each recorded a career-best two helpers. Gonzalez, Sawers, Lexie Morton and Jill Quigley each dished out one assist in the game.
Kavanagh led the way in the draw circle, coming up with five wins on the afternoon. Eagan and Pavinelli each followed with two apiece.
As a squad, Florida recorded 11 caused turnovers, led by a career-high three from Emma Wightman. Haus and Gonzalez each tallied two on the afternoon, while four Gators registered one apiece.
Sarah Reznick led the way with four groundballs, while Haus added three of her own.
In the cage, Reznick came up with three saves and only three goals allowed for a .500 save percentage, while Julia Hammerschlag registered her first save as a Gator during her time between the pipes.
The Gators return to action on March 13 to take on in-state rival Jacksonville – Florida's last opponent before beginning conference play. Opening draw is set for 1 p.m. at DB Milne Field.
JACKSONVILLE 12, EAST CAROLINA 9
GREENVILLE, N.C. – In a physical game that saw the two teams combine for 35 fouls and 10 yellow cards, the ECU lacrosse team fell to visiting Jacksonville 12-9 Saturday afternoon in Johnson Stadium.
ECU finishes the nonconference portion of its schedule with a 2-4 record while Jacksonville improves to 2-0 on the season.
For the second straight game, ECU jumped out to an early lead. Just 63 seconds into the game, France Kimel found Nicole LeGar for the game's opening goal. LeGar turned provider on the next possession when she set up Megan Tryniski for a goal.
Jacksonville fought back to gain control of the game by rattling off a 4-0 run. Alyssa Arnold was a major piece of that, scoring two of those four goals with Sarah Elms and Jenny Kinsey also adding one each.
ECU cut the 4-2 deficit in half at the 17:04 mark when Tryniski found Kimel all alone in front of the Jacksonville goal and Kimel buried it for the goal. However, that was the last score for over 11 minutes until Arnold finally scored a man-up goal at the 6:01 mark. The defensive struggle continued for the remainder of the half as neither team could add a goal, making it 5-3 at the halftime break.
East Carolina came out of the halftime break with some fire. Megan Pallozzi opened the second half scoring when she grabbed a goal off a pass from Tryniski. Just 25 seconds later, Tryniski collected another assist, this time setting up LeGar for the goal.
Jacksonville answered that Pirate run with back-to-back goals of its own, the second coming on another man-advantage opportunity. ECU took advantage of its own numbers advantage just a minute later when Pallozzi scored, with Kimel picking up the assist.
Arnold once again became the engine that drove the Dolphins forward, as she assisted Kinsey and then scored odd a pass from Kasey Stevens to give Jacksonville its biggest lead of the game, at 9-6 with 18:58 remaining.
The two teams traded goals over the next two minutes. Pallozzi completed her hat trick, scoring on a rocket shot after a good feed from LeGar but Elms answered for Jacksonville.
ECU finally got some momentum going when Liz Wilson scored an individual goal followed by the Kimel to Pallozzi connection striking for the second time. That made it 10-9 in favor of Jacksonville and prompted a Dolphin timeout.
Jacksonville made a change following that timeout and it proved pivotal. The Dolphins brought in goalkeeper Dayna Martinetto and the change sparked the team. ECU had three shots to tie the game, including one from the eight-meter arc, but Martinetto made stops on all three. On the other end, ECU's goalkeeper, Ashley Vernon, was matching Martinetto, making a stop of her own on a free-position shot.
But it was Arnold who got the most critical goal of the game. Her tally with 7:26 to go made it 11-9 in favor of Jacksonville. The Dolphins added an insurance goal at 3:11 while ECU saw its final two shots saved by Martinetto.
Pallozzi finished with four goals to lead ECU, while LeGar (two goals, two assists), Tryniski (one goal, three assists) and Kimel (one goal, three assists) all had four points as well. Arnold finished with five goals and an assist for Jacksonville with Elms and Kinsey each adding three points.
Vernon made 12 saves in goal for ECU while Addy Tysdal and Martinetto each had five stops for Jacksonville. LeGar and Camryn Pennypacker led ECU with four draw controls each while Liz Blumthal and Ellie Bromley each forced three turnovers. Blumthal had a team-high four ground balls as well.
The Pirates will have a bye weekend before preparing to start AAC play. East Carolina will open its conference schedule at Old Dominion, taking on the Monarchs on March 19 and 21.
GEORGE WASHINGTON 16, OLD DOMINION 6
NORFOLK, Va. – The Old Dominion women's lacrosse team (2-3) lost a 16-6 contest with George Washington (1-1) on Saturday afternoon at the L.R. Hill Sports Complex. Lilly Siskind and Lindsay Baer scored two goals each for the Monarchs.
"George Washington played a great game today," head coach Heather Holt said. "We were outworked. We have a lot of things to work on over the next couple of practices to prepare for Liberty on Wednesday. We are all very disappointed and will grow and learn from this loss."
The Colonials began the game with a 4-0 scoring run and never looked back. Haley O'Connor put ODU on the board with her fifth goal of the season, assisted by Siskind, at the 19:33 mark, but GW responded with three unanswered.
Baer netted her two goals in quick succession to make the score 7-3 with 5:48 left in the opening half. The junior from Abington, Pennsylvania now has six goals through five games in 2021, two off her single-season best.
Amber Germer's third goal of the day pushed George Washington's advantage to 11-3 after five minutes of play in the second half. Danielle Dundas scored her lone goal of the day nearly five minutes later to cut the deficit to seven.
Siskind scored the Monarchs' final two goals of the game with the last coming from a Baer pass with 3:48 left to play. With two goals on Saturday, the Preseason All-American Athletic Conference honoree now has 12 on the season.
Germer paced the Colonials with four goals, four ground balls and two caused turnovers. Catie Perkins chipped in two goals, one assist and a game-high eight draw controls. GW's 15-9 advantage in draw controls helped negate a 23-16 disadvantage in turnovers.
Maria Rekus caused a game-high four turnovers for ODU and was one of four Monarchs (Paige Angelus, Lauren Carey and Amber Stieve) with two ground balls. Caroline Shaefer finished with three draw controls.
Old Dominion outshot the Colonials, 36-32, and the shots on goal were even at 25-all. Megan Parick made 19 saves in a winning effort.
Jenna Peccia started the game in goal for the Monarchs and made three saves. Brianna Blatter played the final 20:15 in goal and stopped five shots.
ODU wraps up nonconference play with home games against Liberty (Wed., March 10) and No. 17 Richmond (Sun., March 14).