When you’ve never lost a Big East game expectations are high, no matter the opponent, to keep the streak alive. Saturday, against a relatively mediocre Rutgers’ squad, the No. 4 Hoyas did just that, downing the Scarlet Knights, 15-7.
Already 1-0 on the year in conference play, the Georgetown women’s lacrosse (6-1, 2-0) team took the field against Rutgers (5-3, 0-1) with an amazing 31-game conference win streak. And, as a near unanimous selection to win the Big East yet again, the Hoyas are widely expected to run the table yet again. They got a step closer Saturday.
“I think that it was great,” junior attacker Coco Stanwick said of the victory. “It was a big Big East win for us. It was a good team effort. We played real well.”
Freshman midfielder Bridget Noon got the scoring started 6:45 into the game on an unassisted goal. The Hoyas scored four more unanswered goals over the next 14 minutes, as senior defender Stephanie Zodtner, senior midfielder Paige Andrews, senior midfielder Lucy Poole, and sophomore attacker Zan Morley all scored on unassisted tries. Mix in some sloppy Rutgers ball-handling, and the Hoyas were easily staked to a 5-0 lead.
After the Scarlet Knights scored on a goal by freshman midfielder Kathryn Lawrence with 9:25 remaining in the half, the Hoyas got their offensive attack going once more.
Junior attacker Sara Zorzi, from behind the goal, finessed a pass to Zodtner, who proceeded to rifle the ball past the Rutgers goaltender from point-blank range.
With 3:15 to go in the half, junior defender Alison Rogers scored an unassisted goal – her first of the season – to add to the Hoyas’ advantage. Junior attacker Brittany Baschuk and junior attacker Schuyler Sutton both added goals – Sutton’s with less than a second to go in the half – and the Hoyas headed into the locker room with a commanding 9-1 advantage.
After the break, the Hoyas built their lead to 11-1 on goals by Poole and Morley, and after a Scarlet Knights score, made it 12-2 on a goal from Stanwick, but from there, the tide began to turn.
Rutgers made the score 12-3 when freshman attacker Nina Frankoski scored an unassisted goal with 9:21 to go, and 12-4 with junior midfielder Sarah Soden did the same. The Knights trimmed the Hoyas’ lead to 12-5 when sophomore attacker Kate Shomo fired a shot past the nation’s leading goaltender, Georgetown junior Maggie Koch.
The Hoyas stopped the bleeding at the 7:20 mark on a goal by Stanwick, but Rutgers was right back at it at the 2:49 mark when Soden scored her second goal. The Knights scored yet again a minute later when Frankoski completed her hat trick on yet another unassisted goal.
“Rutgers goes hard, they didn’t quit; they kept going hard,” Georgetown Head Coach Ricky Fried said.
Finally, with 1:13 to go, Georgetown decided to improve upon their six-goal lead, getting scores from Poole and Stanwick before the final horn sounded. Stanwick’s third goal – a score that came with just three ticks left on the clock – was assisted by freshman attacker Ashley Lopez.
The game was not as close as the 15-7 score reflected. After taking a 10-goal lead, Fried emptied his bench, resting his best attackers and defenders for the first time sine the season-opening win against Mount St. Mary’s.
“For the majority of the game,” Fried said, “I feel very good about where we are, but we need to make sure that when people get the opportunity to get in, they make the most of that opportunity and they do the things that they do in practice on a regular basis and don’t react differently.”
The Hoyas may have won the game on the draw. For the seventh straight game, Georgetown controlled the draw, but this time it was with a commanding 19-4 advantage.
“It seemed like we dominated draw controls once again,” Fried said. “A lot of that early had to do with Coco, and then as the game went along, we did a good job at the circle making sure we box out and come up with ground balls.”
Stanwick, who had six draw controls, ranks first in Division I in draw controls per game with 6.86.
Georgetown’s advantage was not limited to the draw, however. The Hoyas took 41 shots to Rutgers’ 19; captured 39 ground balls to the Scarlet Knights’ 22; scored on three of seven free position tries in comparison to Rutgers’ 0-2.
Offensively, Stanwick and Poole led the way with three goals a piece, and Zodtner chipped in two of her own. Zorzi had the only two assists.
On the other end of the field, the Hoyas received tight defense from Zodtner and junior defenders Chloe Asselin and Laura Cipro, and clutch goaltending by Koch, who had six saves.
Koch was certainly appreciative of her defense.
“I think our defense is amazing,” she said. “I mean, I might be a little biased, but I think [it is the] best in the country. Today we broke down a little bit at the end, but we’ve been great all season and will continue to be.”
For Koch, the season has been a coming-out party. After transferring from Drexel in fall 2004 and playing just sparingly a year ago, the Philadelphia native is finally getting the chance to shine.
“I just feel fortunate to be playing here after transferring and really not being happy at school,” she said. “Now I just love playing; I love coming to lacrosse every day. So I just feel fortunate to be on this team.”
The Rutgers attack was led by Frankoski, who, with three goals, was a pleasant surprise off of the bench. Defensively, the Scarlet Knights seemed to be relatively porous, and were often bailed out by goaltender Sandra Abel, a freshman. Though she did allow 15 goals, she also made 12 saves. Rutgers’ Head Coach Laura Brand declined to comment about her team’s performance, but after the game seemed to stress to her team that, if they could tie Georgetown in the second half, the Knights certainly were capable of playing the Hoyas closer than 15-7.
While Georgetown did win the game handily, and the Hoyas seem to be cruising along, both Fried and Stanwick were adamant about the fact that there is still plenty of room to improve.
“We stopped doing the little things that made us successful in the first half. We allowed them to get their strong hands, we know they are right handed, and when you do that, they’re going to have success. So we need to just keep fighting to the end,” Fried said about his team’s play in the second half.
“I feel like we’ve come a long way,” Stanwick added. “But we’ve got a lot of things to improve on and we’re not even halfway through the season, so we’re in a good place right now.”
The next chance to show just how good the Hoyas can be comes Friday against a tough No. 5 North Carolina team. The game begins at 3:45 p.m. at the Multi-Sport Facility.