ELON, N.C. – The Notre Dame Fighting Irish (6-2, 2-2) dominated the Elon Phoenix (3-3, 0-0) in a 16-5 road victory at Elon on Tuesday afternoon. The Irish have held their opponents to single-digit scoring six times, as this the fewest goals allowed this season since the 25-0 shutout against Central Michigan.
The Irish outshot the Phoenix 38-12 as they dominated the draw circle 15-6. Freshman Uma Kowalski finished with a game-high seven draw controls as she ranks fourth in the ACC with 56 draws this year.
What a day for Madison Rassas as she scored five goals on just eight shots while also recording two draw controls and a ground ball. She’s amongst the top five in the conference with 22 goals on the season and is averaging 2.75 goals per game.
She was followed by Kate Timarky, who finished with three goals for her fifth hat trick of the season. She is third in the ACC with 23 goals so far this season and is third in goals per game (2.88).
Emma Murphy finished with a career-high five points as she scored two goals and dished out three assists in the win. Grace Maroney recorded four points with two goals and two assists.
Charley Bacigalupo finished with three points as she recorded one goal, two assists, and two ground balls in the win.
Wynter Jock tied her career-high as she scored twice with back-to-back goals in the closing minutes of the period. Meghan O’Hare finished with one goal and three draw controls.
Defensively, Franny O’Brien finished with three caused turnovers and a ground ball. She was followed by Julia Carr with two caused turnovers and three ground balls and Maura Irish with two caused turnovers, one ground ball, and one draw control.
Goalkeeper Ceci Patterson finished with seven saves and a .583 save percentage. In the ACC she ranks fourth with a save percentage of .461, fifth with a 7.88 goals against average, and sixth with 53 saves this season.
The Irish posted an early 3-0 lead to start as Bacigalupo assisted on the first two goals of the day as Timarky put the Irish on the board and was followed by a finish from Rassas. Maroney found the back of the net on the free position shot to put Notre Dame up 3-0 at 7:38 in the first.
Elon responded with a free-position goal of their own, but another free-position goal from Emma Murphy made it a three-goal game yet again at 4-1.
Timarky would knock down one last goal as Murphy found her on a cut to the goal with just seven seconds on the clock to give Notre Dame a 5-1 advantage heading into the second quarter. The Irish won every draw in the first quarter for a 7-0 advantage in the draw circle in the first 15 minutes of play.
The Phoenix took advantage of the player-up opportunity, scoring first in the second period to make it 5-2 before scoring again at 3:47 to cut it to two.
With just 2:00 minutes left, Maroney wrapped around the right side of the crease to send home the final goal of the half to make it 6-3 at halftime.
A dominant third and fourth period from the Irish would ultimately get them to a running clock in the final quarter. The Irish outscored the Phoenix 4-1 in the third quarter with two goals from Rassas and one goal apiece from Murphy and Bacigalupo as the Irish led 10-4 heading into the final period.
Rassas sparked the scoring frenzy to start the fourth as she scored back-to-back goals for her fourth and fifth goals of the day to extend the lead 12-4.
She was followed by back-to-back goals from Jock, before Timarky would go on to cap off her hat trick with just three seconds on the clock.
The Irish secured the road win with seven Irish players in the scoring column for a 16-5 victory.
UP NEXT
The Irish are back on the road as they travel to the west coast to take on Stanford on Saturday, March 14 at 9:00 p.m. ET (6:00 p.m. CT).