Magic Number Three
CHESTERTOWN, Md. -- Three Swarthmore women's lacrosse players scored hat tricks, as the Garnet (4-9, 0-5 CC) dropped a 17-11 decision to Washington (7-6, 2-4 CC) on Tuesday evening on Kibler Field at Roy Kirby, Jr. Stadium.
Swarthmore opened a three-goal lead in the first ten minutes of the game. Junior Marissa Schaffer (Moreland Ohio / Laurel School) shot one past the Washington goalie at 26:41 to put the Garnet on the board. Sophomore midfielder Abbe Muller (West Hartford, Conn. / Conard) received an Alex Gilbert-Bono ’10 (Wellesley, Mass. / St. Mark’s) pass to make the score 2-0 at 22:25. Leading scorer for the Garnet, midfielder Amy Vachal ’11 (Somerset, N.J. / Rutgers Prep), notched one at 21:13 to end the 3-0 run.
The Shorewomen returned all three goals and added one in a four-minute span to take the lead with 3:55 remaining on the clock in the first half.
Vachal broke the Shorewomen’s scoring run when she dished a pass to Muller at 2:39 to knot the score at 4-4. Muller recorded her second goal of the game.
Washington took a 5-4 lead with 33 seconds left in the first half. Swarthmore picked up 15 ground balls and forced six caused turnovers in the first half of the game.
The Shorewomen started the half strong when they made a quick transition down the field to score in the first 44 seconds of the half to make the score 6-4. Washington continued to build-up a sizable lead scoring two more goals to push the score to 8-4 with 26:54 minutes on the board.
At 21:06, Muller scored her twentieth goal of the season, completing her third hat trick of the season.
Picking up back-to-back goals, the Shorewomen advanced their lead to 10-5 with 18:01 left in the game.
Schaffer scored with 15:43 showing on the clock to be the second Garnet player of the evening to score their twentieth goal of the season. The Garnet continued to chip away at the Shorewomen’s lead when Vachal received a pass from Schaffer to cut the deficit to 11-7 with 10:18 remaining the game.
Muller notched her fourth goal of the game before Garnet midfielders Anna de Regt ’09 (Redmond, Wash. / Overlake School) and Vachal scored back-to-back goals 1:42 remaining to make the score 17-10 in favor of the home team. With that goal, de Regt registered her tenth goal of the season while Vachal posted her sixth hat trick.
The Garnet’s last-minute scoring surge ended when Schaffer completed Swarthmore’s third hat trick of the game with 46 seconds remaining in the game to make the final score 17-11.
Susannah Blair ’08 (Princeton, N.J. / Princeton Day) played the entire game between the posts for the Garnet collecting 12 saves while picking up a game-high seven ground balls.
The Garnet return to Clothier Field on Saturday, April 12 when they host Muhlenberg in a 1:00 p.m. contest.
Click here for FULL BOX.