The Boston University women’s lacrosse team met the United States Military Academy at Nickerson Field Saturday for the final game of the regular season and emerged with a 14-3 victory.
BU (9-7, 6-3 Patriot League) opened the scoring early when senior midfielder Remy Nolan buried a pass from freshman midfielder Kaitlin Belval just four minutes into the game. The Terriers added two more goals before Army (5-11, 0-8 Patriot League) could respond.
Army’s first goal came 8:01 into the contest off the stick of freshman Izzy McMahon. The Black Knights scored twice more in the second half, but the Terrier offensive and defensive prowess proved too much. The score was 8-1 in favor of BU going into the locker room, and the Terriers ultimately added six more tallies before the final buzzer.
“We knew how we wanted to attack them,” said BU head coach Liz Robertshaw. “[Army has] a very good zone defense. I told them I wanted them to be aggressive from the very first start. We weren’t going and slowing the pace down, we needed to play fast.”
Terrier seniors played an important role on their Senior Day at Nickerson Field, leading the team on both sides of the ball.
Senior midfielder Jill Horka kept the ball in Terrier hands by dominating the draw circle. She won seven draw controls, making up just under half of the Terriers’ 15 draw controls in the contest. In seizing possession from Army, seniors such as Nolan (hat trick) and Ally Adams (one goal, ground ball and draw control) were allowed to shine.
Of the seven different Terriers who found the back of the net, four were seniors. Seniors also made up five of the nine Terriers who registered points. On a day in which the seniors played a special role, Robertshaw remarked that it’ll be difficult to eventually bid them farewell.
“I think it’ll be hard, but that’s my job,” Robertshaw said. “I’ve got to be able to let them go.”
Freshmen also played a vital role in BU’s victory. Belval scored two goals and assisted on the first goal of the day, while midfielder Kelly Mathews found the back of the net once.
On the other side of the field, BU remained stout from start to finish. The Black Knights only registered 14 shots and did not hold possession in the BU’s zone until eight minutes ticked off the clock.
Junior goalkeeper Caroline Meegan stopped four shots and allowed only three goals, the latter of which is a season low. As a result, Robertshaw said her team was well prepared and cohesive defensively.
“Defensively, I think they just played together,” Robertshaw said. “I just think that we had a good game plan defensively going into it, and they did what I was asking them to do. I was proud of them.”
With Saturday’s win in the bag, the Terriers clinched home field advantage in the quarterfinal round of the Patriot League Tournament. They’ll host an opponent that will be determined by the week’s end and will try and replicate last year’s playoff win over Lehigh University.
