April 30, 2008

Box Score

Berkeley, CA - In the opening round of the 2008 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation women's lacrosse tournament, No. 6 seeded Saint Mary's suffered a 19-4 loss to the No. 3 seeded Stanford Cardinal from Memorial Stadium on the University of California campus. The loss drops the Gaels' overall record to 2-15, while the Cardinal improved to 10-8 overall.

The game opened with Stanford scoring the first goal just a couple minutes into play. Saint Mary's answered with a goal by Abbie Coleman a few minutes later, but the Cardinal rallied to score the next five goals to open a 5-1 lead. SMC scored there second goal at the 17:40 mark of the first half when P.J. Hainley scored her team leading 22nd goal of the season off an assist from Clair Purcell.

Following the Hainley goal, Stanford closed out the first half with a 9-0 run to take a 14-2 lead at halftime. Stanford held a 23-8 advantage in shots, and an 11-6 lead in draw controls in the first half.

After the intermission Stanford continued its scoring streak, connecting on the first five goals of the half to score 14 unanswered goals. Saint Mary's would get goals by P.J. Hainley on a free position shot with 6:25 left. Hainley then returned the favor on her first goal by assisting Purcell on the final goal of the game with 3:29 remaining in regulation.

Hainley finished the game with four points on a team-high two goals and two assists. Purcell finished with a goal and one assists and Coleman has just on the goal, which was assisted by Hainley.

Saint Mary's will close out the 2008 season on Thursday when the Gaels take on the UC Davis Aggies at 11 a.m. in the MPSF Tournament consolation game. UC Davis was defeated by Oregon on Wednesday 14-9 in the opening game of the tournament.