WOMEN’S LAX Perfect No More UNC Stops No. 1 Hoyas’ Win Streak By Derek Richmond Hoya Staff Writer

Proving how tenuous its hold on the No. 1 spot in women’s lacrosse was, Georgetown finally succumbed to an opponent, falling for the first time this season 11-10 to No. 5 North Carolina.

For the third time this season, the Tarheels knocked off the top-ranked team, this time ending the Hoyas’ best start ever and sending them to the No. 2 national ranking spot.

“Both teams played hard,” Georgetown Head Coach Kim Simons said. “It was really an up and down game in terms of the intensity by both teams but also the scoring. It was big lead changes and I thought the biggest issue was the fact that once we finally got ourselves into the game and got a lead we let down on the intensity and focus and let them get back into the game.”

Georgetown led 6-3 at the half following six unanswered goals. Sophomore midfielder Gloria Lozano had four goals on the day, scoring the first two of the game for the Hoyas, but it was not enough to keep Georgetown from losing its first game of the season.

UNC jumped out to a quick lead less than five minutes into the game. Trailing 3-0, Georgetown’s offense finally came to life. After Lozano’s tallies, junior attack Wick Stanwick capitalized on a free-position shot at the 10:47 mark to tie the game. The momentum swung to Georgetown’s favor as senior attack Erin Elbe found the back of the net twice, once with only 16 seconds left in the first half.

The Hoyas won the draw following Elbe’s goal and sophomore midfielder Michi Ellers raced down the field to deposit the last goal of the period and give Georgetown a three goal lead going into the break.

The Tarheels initiated the second-half scoring with a goal from senior midfielder Christine McPike. Georgetown answered with two straight before Carolina would score again to make the lead 8-4.

Each team scored another goal before the Tarheels took over. UNC reeled off five consecutive goals and regained the lead 10-9 with just over two minutes left in the game. The Hoyas hopes for continuing their unbeaten season were dwindling.

“You can’t expect to win against a team like Carolina when you let a team score five unanswered goals,” Simons said.

Georgetown’s prospects were brightened when, with 1:25 left on the clock, Lozano put the ball in the cage for the fourth time in the contest. UNC won the draw after the goal, however, and with 48 ticks remaining, sounded the death knell of the Hoya’s winning streak, going up 11-10.

Simons emphasized the importance of ball control. “We’ve got to get some draws, and make sure we’re taking care of the ball and not having turnovers in key points of the game,” she said.

Despite outshooting the Tarheels 25-20, Georgetown gave up a 27-20 advantage in groundballs, 12-10 advantage in turnovers and won only one more draw than Carolina.

“Our team really goes with the draws, I think most other teams do. If we could’ve gotten a few of them down the stretch, I think it would’ve had a different outcome,” Lozano said.

The Hoyas look to rebound from this loss on Thursday when they face No. 18 James Madison. Coming off a win over Maryland, Simons said that JMU will be hungry for a win to keep their season going forward.

As for the Hoyas, Lozano boiled down what the loss means. “I think that this gives us a lot of perspective. This season was the first time that we’ve ever been undefeated for this long and ranked No. 1, and I think that we were starting to get very complacent about it. I think that in a way this will help us focus for the rest of the season, so I hope we learn from this and come out better on Thursday.”

Face-off against JMU will be Thursday at 3 p.m.