W. Lacrosse Opens Season in Snowstorm

After nearly a month of practice in Ithaca’s inclement weather conditions, the women’s lacrosse team won’t be fazed by a little bit of “wintry mix.” Although yesterday’s men’s game against Binghamton was called off due to uncooperative weather, the women plan on playing their first official game of the season today at Colgate — rain, snow or shine.

“Their grounds crew is staying on top of the snow and they’re going to work into the night,” said head coach Jenny Graap ’86. “We’re anticipating that we’ll be able to play. We’re hopeful.”

[1]Step up: Junior Jessica Wiegand, who scored 14 goals last year in her first season as a starter, will help open the Red’s season today.

Should the conditions be payable, the Red (0-0) should have its hands full. The Raiders (1-2) are already three games into the season and are averaging 13 goals per game. Despite the high offensive output by Colgate, the Red just wants to focus on getting through its first game.

“A lot of our gameplan going into Colgate is for [us] to focus on ourselves and to make sure our game is where we want it to be both offensively and defensively,” Graap said. “We’re aware of Colgate and their scoring power, but I think that at this stage in the game we need to understand that this is our first game, their fourth game, and we need to be ready to fire it up and play hard no matter how good their attack or their midfield is.”

The Raiders defeated La Salle, 14-9, in their last game. Colgate’s two losses have been in shoot-outs to Stony Brook and Binghamton, by scores of 18-14 and 12-11, respectively. Sophomore Brie Moran has led the Raider offense so far this season with eight goals and an assist, followed closely by senior tri-captain Lindsay Pittard’s eight goals.

“They appear to be a talented team and we certainly need to be on our defensive game, ready to play some good team defense and to hopefully force some wide-angle shots and limit some of their offensive output,” Graap said.

The Red scrimmaged against Penn State on Feb. 17, but is eager for the first official game of the 2008 season.

“Tomorrow’s first game presents the challenge of putting it all together after practicing since Feb. 1,” Graap said. “The scrimmage was certainly a wonderful opportunity to play a quality [Division I] team with Penn State and now we have one that really counts.”