After 10 years of bitter disappointment, the women’s lacrosse team (6-2, 3-1 Ivy) finally broke through against conference rival Dartmouth, defeating the Green, 14-6, Saturday on Schoellkopf Field.
“I think what you saw today was so much emotion, so much energy because we really, really wanted this win,” said an elated head coach Jenny Graap ’86. “It means a lot to our program.”
“We wanted Dartmouth to go away feeling the same way we felt last year,” added senior goalie Carrie Giancola, “it’s a long bus ride home, and we wanted them to think about how bad we beat them.”
Using a tight, meticulous defense and opportunistic attack, the Red dominated play throughout. After trading goals with the Green (5-3, 2-2) early on, Cornell went on a 4-0 run to end the first half. Junior Sarah Fischer scored two of the four goals en route to a four-point performance on the game. Fischer’s second goal of the game came with one second remaining in the first half and gave the Red a 6-2 halftime lead.
The Red came out strong in the second half, with freshman Julia Hughey finding the back of the net just 42 seconds in.
Dartmouth struck back less than a minute later as Jen Newitt scored her second goal of the game at 31:40. Cornell responded with three straight goals to extend its lead to 10-3.
The Red completed its second 3-0 run of the half with Hughey’s second goal of the game — a career high — at 56:21. With Cornell’s lead at 14-5, Dartmouth scored the final goal of the game 26 seconds later, as Alison Moulin scored off a feed from Whitney Jamison.
Senior Lori Wohschlegel, in her first start since returning from a knee injury, recorded a hat trick and added an assist. Her three goals move her past Carol Johnson ’80 into ninth place on the Cornell career list. With the assist, she moves into a tie for second place for career assists.
“My teammates supported me the whole way through,” she said, “I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.”
Classmate Jamiee Reynolds also tallied three goals and an assist, moving into second place on the career points list with 157.
Keeping pace with the potent attack was Giancola, who had a spectacular game, recording nine saves on 15 shots.
“This was Carrie’s best game so far this season,” commented Graap. “Whenever your keeper is playing like that, great things happen.”
Combined with Yale’s loss to Princeton, the Red moves into a tie for second place in the Ivy League with the win, just a half game behind Princeton. Cornell returns to action Friday night in Providence, with a 7 pm tilt against Brown.
Archived article by Owen Bochner