The Boston University women’s lacrosse team fell just short on Saturday afternoon against Lehigh University, losing 13-12 in a game that came down to the final possession.
Road games have been a problem all season long for the Terriers (4-6, 2-2 Patriot League), who are now 1-5 away from Nickerson Field.
Similar to several of its previous games, BU found itself in a tightly-contested matchup early on. It took over 14 minutes for either team to establish a multi-goal lead, as Lehigh finally broke through to take a 4-2 lead, thanks to a goal from defender/midfielder Julianne D’Orazio.
The Mountain Hawks were unable to build upon this lead right away, as junior midfielder Caroline English scored a few minutes later to bring the score to 4-3, and when Lehigh struck again to make it 5-3, senior attackers Taylor Hardison and Elisabeth Jayne each scored, tying the game at five goals each.
Junior attacker Mickenzie Larivee continued the Terrier attack, scoring two straight goals in a three-minute span. D’Orazio scored her second goal of the game for the Mountain Hawks in the final seconds of the half, making it 7-5 in favor of BU at halftime.
Through the first half, the Terriers were able to establish a 21-16 lead in shots and an 11-3 lead in draw controls, but had committed six turnovers to Lehigh’s four. BU had also allowed a few too many free position shots for head coach Liz Robertshaw’s liking, an issue which plagued them in the second half as well.
“The fact that we gave up 10 free position shots, five for goals, I think that’s huge,” Robertshaw said. “I wasn’t really thrilled with the way the game was called … but regardless, I think we need to do a better job of adjusting to the officials and not putting our opponent on the line. I think we need to be smarter defensively in order to limit those looks.”
The score remained close at the start of the second half, as BU scored twice and Lehigh scored once during the first five minutes of the period. The Terriers briefly opened a three-goal lead thanks to a goal from sophomore midfielder Kelly Mathews around the 20-minute mark, but Lehigh responded quickly, bringing the score to 10-8.
This was the first of several straight goals for Lehigh, who proceeded to go on an incredible tear, taking a 13-10 lead thanks to goals from several players, including two from D’Orazio.
Following Lehigh’s 13th goal, the Terriers snapped out of their slump, as Larivee scored her second set of back-to-back goals, bringing BU within one score with just over six minutes remaining.
Robertshaw was not surprised by Larivee’s scoring bursts, and hopes to see it more often.
“It’s something that we’ve seen and that we know she has in her, to produce on multiple occasions,” Robertshaw said. “We saw it today which is great, and we need to see it more often … It helped push us ahead and get us back in the game when we were behind.”
Unfortunately for BU, Larivee’s goal would be the final score for either team that afternoon. The Terriers only managed one more shot during the game, and had a chance for a free position goal in the final seconds, but started moving too early and surrendered possession to the Mountain Hawks.
Strategically, Robertshaw was satisfied with the way the Terriers conducted their offense, but felt that the team may be developing a recurring execution problem.
“There’s nothing I would call differently,” Robertshaw said. “We got the looks that we wanted, we just didn’t get the shots off. That’s something we’ve been battling for a couple games now, we need to do a better job of running our set.”
