Garnet Slay Knights in Season Finale
Ele Forbes '05 saved the best for last as she recorded a career-high five goals in her final collegiate game to lead the Garnet (8-8) to a 16-8 victory at Neumann.
The Garnet jumped out to a 3-0 lead as Megan Speare '05, Forbes and Niamh Shortt '06 each scored goals just 4:10 apart. The Knights answered, as they scored the next three goals to tie the game with 16:43 remaining in the first half. Samantha Lafferty scored twice and added an assist on Kolleen Kitzinger's goal.
Forbes scored her second on a Heidi Fieselmann '06 assists at 14:49 to regain the lead but Michelle Roberts tied the match at 4-4 2:30 later.
From there it was all Swat, as the Garnet used a 5-0 run to open a 9-4 halftime advantage. Lindsay Roth '07 scored the first of four goals at 10:10 on a Forbes assist and then the Garnet struck quick with three goals in 57 seconds. Megan Sanborn '08 opened the floodgates as she converted a Fieselmann helper with 4:52 remaining. Fieselmann picked up her first of three at 4:11 on a Shortt pass and Forbes recorded the hat trick just 12 seconds later off a Fieselmann dish to make it 8-4. Forbes added her fourth of the game with 35 second left off a Katie Crawford '07 assist.
The Garnet kept the pressure on as Crawford made it six in a row with a goal just 25 seconds into the half. Fieselmann collected her second goal of the game at 24:31 and Roth picked up her second goal with 20:24 remaining to give the Garnet eight straight and a 12-4 lead.
Neumann stopped the bleeding with three goals in a span of 1:24 to close to within 12-7 with 16:24 remaining. Kitzinger added two goals for the hat trick and Lafferty picked up her third of the game to cut into the Garnet lead.
Roth collected her third goal of the game and her fifth hat trick of the season at 12:40 and added her fourth goal just 1:55 later to make it a 14-7 game.
Forbes tallied her career-high fifth goal with 5:51 remaining off a Shortt pass to give the Garnet a 15-7 lead. Lafferty then added her fourth of the game with 3:54 left.
Fieselmann closed out the scoring with her third goal of the game, and third hat trick of the season at the 2:21 mark. The junior also added three assists for a season-best six points.
Forbes closes her career with 53 goals and 14 assists for 67 points.