Women's Lacrosse: Defeat puts season in jeopardy

In the first half, the Quakers grabbed a quick 4-1 lead, but the Tigers fought their way back to a two-point deficit by the end of the half, at 6-4 in Penn’s favor. But the fatigued and frustrated Princeton team spent most of its time on Penn’s attack end in the second half, netting only one more goal and allowing six from Penn.

One contributing factor to Penn’s offensive firepower was midfielder Ali DeLuca, who was responsible for half of the Quakers’ goals for the night with two of her own and four assists.

Penn opened up the scoring three minutes into the first half, but the Quakers’ next shot proved fruitless, and freshman attacker Jaci Gassaway quickly knotted the score at 1-1 five minutes into play. However, the first Penn attacker to get a shot off — unsuccessfully — came back for more, and this time she found victory in the net.

In the eight minutes after Princeton’s first goal, Penn managed to tip the score to 4-1. At the midpoint of the half, the Tigers started to come back when junior tri-captain and attacker Lizzy Drumm, the leading goal scorer for the team, scored an unassisted goal.

Penn added two more goals to bring its winning margin to four.

With two-and-a-half minutes left in the half, Drumm received the ball from Gassaway behind the cage and quickly spun around the crease to fire a hard shot into the left corner of the net. The Tigers scored again with 15 seconds left when senior attacker and tri-captain Kristin Morrison fed the ball to sophomore midfielder Allison Behringer in a chaotic eight-meter situation, and Behringer leapt to loft a high shot into the cage.

Unfortunately for Princeton, a two-goal deficit was as close as the team would get for the remainder of the match. The first six minutes of the second period were characterized by a frenzied series of turnovers, fouls and failed free-position attempts, before Penn finally managed to score to bring the tally to 7-4.

Less than a minute later, Drumm fed the ball to senior midfielder Jenna Washabaugh, who scored from a direct position in front of the cage off the crease.

That goal, only seven-and-a-half minutes into the half, would be the Tigers’ last. Penn scored the last five goals of the game.

Penn carried only a slight edge in ground balls and draw controls, and Princeton only had one more foul than Penn. The real story lies in the number of shots taken, which indicates clear control of the game on the part of the Quakers, as well as turnovers — Penn turned the ball over 10 times, while the Tigers accounted for 15 turnovers. Senior goalie Kaitlyn Perrelle was in the cage for the majority of the game and had six saves. Sophomore goalie Erin Tochihara also played for 10 minutes and stopped all four shots she faced.

While Penn had already secured one of four places in the Ivy League tournament before this game took place, the Tigers, who were previously in third in the conference standings, cannot be sure that they will attend the tournament in its inaugural year.

On Sunday, Princeton will play in its last regular-season game, taking on Dartmouth in Princeton Stadium at 1 p.m.

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It is the Big Green’s last matchup as well, and the league tournament is well within reach for Dartmouth, so an hour of fierce competition should be expected.