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Princeton University Athletics
Princeton University
No. 11 Penn
Players Mentioned
Women's Lacrosse Wins at Penn, Stays Unbeaten in Ivy League
April 16, 2015 | Women's Lacrosse
Box Score
PHILADELPHIA (4/15/15) - A patient and deliberate offense led to No. 13 Princeton taking a 9-7 win over No. 11 Penn at Franklin Field this evening, and the Tigers remain undefeated in the Ivy League with perfect 5-0 record.
Highlighting the win was senior All-America Erin McMunn scoring her 200th career point. She is just the sixth Tiger in Princeton history to collect 200 points.
Princeton (10-3, 5-0 Ivy) hosts Columbia and Brown to end the regular season. A win in either game would mean Princeton would be the site for the Ivy League tournament and would give Princeton at least a share of the Ivy championship.
"The key for us was the possession that we had," Princeton head coach Chris Sailer said. "We were able to control the ball in our attack end and Penn is such a threat and so dynamic offensively we knew we had to control possession. If we did, we knew we would get some looks and some opportunities, and we did. And that comes from kids making great plays on the draw, kids making stops on defense, carrying the ball and getting in safely on the attack end and the attack making good decisions, so it was definitely a full-team effort."
The Tigers won the first three draw controls and didn't allow the Quakers (10-3, 4-1 Ivy) to even touch the ball until 9:23 had ran off the clock.
The first possession was a long one, but all that mattered was the result, and that was a goal. Senior Erin Slifer scored her 28th goal of the season, an unassisted goal. Freshman Abby Finkelston made it 2-0 Tigers after she was awarded a free-position and converted the attempt.
Iris Williamson was awarded a free-position attempt but the awkward angle led her to pass the ball and Tory Benson collected and ran to goal to score. DeSimone converted an eight-meter on the next possession at 18:44 and two minutes later Penn took its first lead on a Nina Corcoran goal, forcing Princeton to call a timeout
A yellow card on Penn's top defender Meg Markham, after contact to the head on junior Stephanie Paloscio, who won the ensuing draw gave Princeton a great chance to even up the game, but the Tigers couldn't get one by goalie Lucy Ferguson.
JuniorAnya Gersoff got right on top of Ferguson but she stopped the shot with McMunn catching the rebound. Slifer was then denied on an eight meter as she tried to go low on Ferguson.
The Tigers broke through with Slifer's second of the game at 9:47 with a beautiful goal, slinging in a side shot to knot the game at 3-3. Slifer set up the Tigers next goal at 6:48, as she delivered an alley-oop to sophomore Olivia Hompe, putting the ball in front of the net for Hompe to finish.
Slifer was fouled on the net draw, as Lindsey Smith was awarded the ball. On the restart, she took off towards the goal with a head of steam and threw the ball in to halt the 2-0 run and tie the game at 4-4.
Sophomore goalie Ellie DeGarmo had a big stop on Corcoran just as the announcer made the two-minute warning and Penn would hold the ball for the final shot. It was Emily Rogers-Healion that had the last say, scoring on a Corcoran feed to give the Quakers a 5-4 lead at the half.
Princeton used a 5-1 run in the second half to take the largest lead of the game, 9-6.
Hompe added the first two goals of the game, connecting with Slifer for the second time or the first goal of the second half and then scoring a free-position goal to regain the lead for Princeton, 6-5 at 24:18.
Penn had more shots on the next possession than on any other. Sarah Barcia shot wide on an eight-meter attempt, Catherine Dickinson was left unmanned on the weak side and hit a pipe and Tory Bensen had a shot save by DeGarmo before DeSimone was able to get one by to knot the game at 6-6.
McMunn was called for warding and Penn got possession but a great pick off by Amanda Leavell on the ride instantly gave the Tigers the ball back. McMunn made up for the cal, scoring her 16th goal of the season and her 200th career point.
Penn's next possession resulted in Williamson hitting the pipe and Gersoff grabbing the ground ball. Five minutes later Princeton would take a two-goal edge as Paloscio swatted down a pass from McMunn at 18:11.
Caroline Cummings won the ensuing draw but inadvertently passed to Hompe, once again giving Princeton time with the ball.
Gersoff scored Princeton's ninth goal, giving the Tigers' their largest lead at 7:37. McMunn tried to go towards the goal and then got trapped with a triple team and Gersoff was there to bail her out and bury the goal.
A draw control win by Markham led quickly to a Benson goal at 6:48.
Junior Maddy Lynch won the final draw control of the game and with Megan Kelly picking up a yellow card Princeton had a player advantage with 5:30 left to play. The Tigers were content to pass the ball around and but nearly had it picked off by Ferguson with Hompe swooping in to pick uo the loose ball as Princeton called a timeout with 2:32 remaining.
Penn brought on the double team and Ferguson came out to play defense knowing full well that Princeton was not going to give the ball up easily. It was Williamson that caused the turnover with 41 seconds left and the final shot, by Bensen, would be thwarted by DeGarmo as the Princeton bench swarmed the field in victory.
"Coming into the game we knew it would be a dogfight, so being down at halftime didn't really phase us," Hompe said. "We got a lot of energy from our D. Ellie and our defense were making some really great stops and we had some great transitions and great draw controls and that kind of energy fed into our offense and we were abel to put it in the net."
DeGarmo finished the night with four saves, as did Ferguson.
Penn had a slight 17-15 edge in shots, while both teams won nine draw controls apiece.
Princeton takes on Columbia on Saturday, April 18 at 1 p.m.