Nicked at night

In front of its own crowd at the ‘Nick at Nite’ showdown, the No. 12 Boston University women’s lacrosse team rolled over No. 16 Dartmouth College, 15-8, for the Terriers 10th straight win. All-American senior Sarah Dalton and junior Erica Baumgartner led the way with a combined 15 points, as Dalton tied her own BU single-season record of 71 goals.

Throughout most of the game, rain poured down on Nickerson field, but the weather did little to deter the Terriers. BU dominated the Big Green, opening with a goal by Dalton less than a minute into the game. After a slow stretch of ten minutes, Dartmouth tied the game, but BU struck right back with a goal from junior Traci Landy and a second by Dalton. Baumgartner assisted both of those goals, and fed out four helpers in the first half alone. She also notched two goals, including a beautiful shot from the top of the arc on a free position with one second left in the half, giving the Terriers a commanding 9-2 lead.

‘Awesome game for [Baumgartner] today,’ BU coach Liz Robertshaw said. ‘She had some great passes and took some great looks. That’s what we want to see out of her.’

Dartmouth showed signs of life in the second half, beginning with a goal by freshman Kristen Goldberg roughly two minutes in. Goldberg led the way for Dartmouth with three goals.

Landy and Dalton struck again to put the Terriers up, 11-3, but Dartmouth rallied for two more goals by sophomores Greta Meyer and Kat Collins. The Big Green seemed to be mounting a comeback.

‘[Dartmouth was] able to respond in the second half, and I think we took a little bit too long to make adjustments,’ Robertshaw said. ‘We had a few too many fouls, and the two yellow cards slowed us down so we weren’t able to attack the cage as much as we would normally.’

But just when the momentum seemed to have shifted, Baumgartner and Dalton responded again with a goal each to put the Terriers up, 13-5.’ Dalton capped the scoring with 10:17 left with her record tying and nation’s best 71st goal of the year.

‘Honestly, I’m not surprised by our performance today,’ Robertshaw said. ‘We know [Dartmouth is] a good team, but this is the type of performance I expect of us.’

Junior goalkeeper Rachel Klein held Dartmouth to only eight goals, lowering her season average to 10.05 goals allowed per game. She had seven saves and picked up one groundball. On the opposite side, Dartmouth goalie junior Julie Wadland could not slow down the Terrier attack and was only able to save three shots.

On the stat sheet, Dartmouth beat the Terriers in several categories, including time of possession, groundballs, fouls and turnovers. They even outshot the Terriers 15-10 in the second half. But the Terriers fast, aggressive tempo proved too much for Dartmouth’s slow, methodic approach. BU could have easily put a few more points on the board after Dartmouth pulled the goalie in the game’s final minutes, but Dalton and the Terriers politely declined to shoot at the wide open net, content to run out the clock for the win.