Feb. 20, 2009
NOTRE DAME, Ind. – The No. 11/11 Notre Dame women’s lacrosse team dropped its home opener, 21-5, to No. 1/1 Northwestern Friday at the Loftus Sports Center.
The Irish fall to 1-1 on the season, while the Wildcats improve to 3-0.
Jillian Byers and Kailene Abt led the Irish with two points each. Byers scored two goals for Notre Dame, while Abt had one goal and one assist. Shaylyn Blaney and Maggie Tamasitis each scored a goal, Kaitlin Keena and Maggie Zentgraf added one assist each for the Irish.
The Wildcats were led by Hilary Brown with nine points on six goals and three assists. Danielle Spencer added four goals and three assists, while Hannah Nielsen totaled three goals and four assists for Northwestern. Katrina Dowd added three goals and one assist, Casey Donohoe scored twice, and Lacey Vigmostad, Samantha Santulli and Kristin McCandlish each scored one goal.
Northwestern jumped out to an early 5-0 lead, before the Irish were able to get on the board.
Bowen put the Wildcats up 1-0 just two minutes in the contest to start Northwestern’s 5-0 run.
Abt put the Irish on the board at 15:25 off an assist from Keena.
Northwestern answered with five more goals, before Tamasitis cut the Wildcat lead to 10-2 at 2:25 off an Abt assist.
Northwestern scored again to take an 11-2 lead into the break.
The Wildcats came out swinging in the second period, with Spencer scoring their 12th goal of the night just one minute in.
Northwestern scored five more and led 17-2, before Byers’ scored Notre Dame’s third goal of the night at 7:21.
Blaney scored for the Irish with just over five minutes to play to make it a 21-4 game.
Byers scored her second goal of the night with 2:15 left off an assist from Zentgraf to make it 21-5.
Erin Goodman saw 60:00 minutes in goal for the Irish, recording nine saves. Morgan Lathrop recorded eight saves for Northwestern in 52:27. Darby St. Clair added one save in 5:11 and Brianne LoManto notched one save in 2:22.
The Irish return to the Loftus Sunday at 1 p.m. to host Ohio State.
–ND–