he Elizabethtown College women’s lacrosse team fought to the last second against the nationally ranked (No. 14) Messiah Falcons April 13 on Wolf Field. Senior Becky Porter found the net to tie the game with 24 seconds remaining in regulation to send the game into overtime. The Blue Jays could not find the net in the extra period. Messiah’s Lizzy Keeney converted the lone goal in overtime, giving the Falcons the 9-8 win.
Messiah struck early against the Blue Jays. Marybeth Bindel found the net in the first five minutes from a pass from Keeney. Nearly five minutes later, Kiersten McGreer slipped one past senior goalie Rachael Waldman to take a 2-0 lead in favor of the Falcons.
Despite the Falcons controlling the game early, the Blue Jays (6-6, 2-2 CC) responded immediately. Sophomore Leigh Anne Flounlacker scored an unassisted opportunity to cut the lead to one. Four minutes later, senior Emily Butler scored her 16th goal of the season from a pass from Porter to tie the game back up.
With ten minutes remaining in the first period, Keeney scored and put the Falcons back up one. The Blue Jays took their first lead of the game when Porter and Flounlacker scored back-to-back goals. Thirteen seconds after Flounlacker’s goal, Carly Bajus tied the game back up for the Falcons. For the remaining five minutes of the first period, the Blue Jays and Falcons went to a standstill. The score going into halftime was 4-4.
The Falcons came out firing in the second half. Messiah’s Keeney scored two of the next three goals and Gabrielle Hamelryck tallied another for the visitors, leaving the Blue Jays trailing 7-4.
Battling back against the Falcons, Butler added another goal at the 19:50 mark to shrink the Falcon lead to two. Etown’s defense only allowed one more goal at the 13:56 mark to Keeney, who increased Messiah’s lead to three once again.
Waldman made eight saves on the day, three of them occurring in the last thirteen minutes of regulation time and the most crucial one as time expired in the second half.
The Blue Jays dominated the last 13 minutes of the game. The defense, led by senior co-captain and Etownian Sports Editor Alexis Morris, together had 28 groundballs and forced a total of 21 turnovers compared to the Falcons’ 20 groundballs and 19 turnovers.
Flounlacker initiated the comeback by finding the net twice within one minute, boosting the score to 8-7 in favor of Messiah with seven minutes remaining. With one minute to go, Porter forced a turnover in the Etown zone and picked up the groundball to instigate the Blue Jay comeback. Finding the right moment to attack, Porter found an opening in the middle and sent in a shot past Falcon goalie Taylor Phillips. With the score tied 8-8, the Blue Jays forced overtime with a defensive stop as time expired.
Unfortunately, the Falcons scored the sole goal of the extra session, securing their victory against Etown 9-8. However, the Blue Jays hope to follow the same path as last year and meet the Falcons once again in the Commonwealth Conference Championship game.
Butler said after the hard fought game, “We played so well, and now we know we have the ability and talent to play at that high level.”
Butler and the rest of the team know that they will have to keep improving if they want to see a rematch with the Falcons in the playoffs. “We still need to touch up on some things, such as draws and getting ground balls, but the thing that will help us the most is mentally knowing we can win if we work together to do so. We are also lacking some key players due to injuries, and hopefully they will be back in time for the playoffs,” Butler said.
Letting up early goals seems to be a common trend for the Blue Jays. Butler commented, “We also need to work on not letting teams put a few goals on us in the beginning in the game. We come out slow and get stuck in a hole because teams score on us, and we have to spend the game catching up, such as Stevenson. If we just come out hard from the get-go we won’t get stuck like that.”
Despite the recent injuries that have caused some players to miss action in games, the team remains hopeful. Junior Natalie Hrynkiewicz said, “Lower classmen have stepped up for various players as a unit including many freshmen that have made an impact in many games.”
After the tough loss to Messiah, the Jays came back strong against Lycoming College Wednesday. Etown handed the Warriors a huge 23-12 defeat. Flounlacker put up seven goals and nine assists in the win, good for 16 total points. The 16 points is a new school record for points in a game. Flounlacker previously broke this record in a 14-point game over Hood College. Porter also had a big game with six goals. Junior goalie Shelby Bruno picked up 11 saves in the win.
The Blue Jays look forward to their coming games and are seeking another Commonwealth playoff appearance and championship. The Blue Jays will host Albright College April 20 at 1 p.m. at Wolf Field.
