May 14, 2006
Notre Dame, Ind. – The Notre Dame women’s lacrosse team advanced to the quarterfinals of the NCAA Women’s Lacrosse Tournament on Sunday afternoon as the Irish eliminated Cornell with a 16-8 win at Moose Krause Stadium.
The win advances the Irish to a quarterfinal match up next Saturday, May 20 versus third-seed Georgetown. The Hoyas, the 2006 BIG EAST champions, defeated Monmouth, 18-2, in their opening round game. The game will be played at Moose Krause Stadium at 1:00 p.m. since the Hoyas cannot host this year.
In Sunday’s win over Cornell, Notre Dame (14-3) got big games on both sides of the ball. The Irish defense held Cornell to eight goals behind strong play in front of goalkeeper Carol Dixon (Gr., Pennsauken, N.J.) who finished with 12 saves in the game. Crysti Foote (Sr., Suffern, N.Y.) and Jillian Byers (Fr., Northport, N.Y.) paced the Notre Dame offense with four goals and two assists each. Sophomore Caitlin McKinney (Lafayette Hill, Pa.) added three goals while Heather Ferguson (So., Newtown Square, Pa.) and Kaki Orr (Jr., Darien, Conn.) scored twice and Brittany Fox (Sr., Annapolis, Md.) added a solo goal.
Noelle Dowd led Cornell (12-4) with four goals on the afternoon. Allison McKeown, Allison Schindler, Mimi Baveye and Courtney Farrell scored single goals for the Big Red.
Cornell wasted little time in the game, jumping out to a 3-0 lead on goals by Dowd, Farrell and Schindler in the first 8:19 of the game.
Following Schindler’s goal, Irish head coach Tracy Coyne, who picked up her 200th career win in the game, called a time out to settle her team down.
“I called the timeout just to get us settled down. We had some early-game jitters and we just needed to regroup. Crysti’s (Foote) goal loosened us up and we got our confidence back.”
With four goals and two assists Crysti Foote became Notre Dame’s first 100-point scorer in the NCAA Tournament win over Cornell. The senior now has 68 goals and 34 assists for 102 points this season.
|
 |
Foote’s goal, one of three free-position goals in the game for the Irish All-American and Tewaaraton Trophy candidate, came just 1:23 after Coyne’s time out and started Notre Dame on a 10-1 run that would give the Irish a six-goal lead early in the second half.
Orr cut the lead to 3-2 at 18:36 with her first goal of the game via a free-position shot. Byers scored twice in a 1:05 span to put the Irish ahead 4-3 with 15:59 left in the first half. Her second goal came off a Foote assist, giving the Irish scoring leader her 33rd helper of the season and 69th of her career, both new Irish records for assists.
“We got off to a fast start with the three goals but Notre Dame was quick to tie it in a five-minute span,” said Cornell head coach Jenny Graap.
“When they went ahead 4-3, they grabbed the momentum. Emotionally, the momentum was important and they were able to keep it into the second half.”
Dowd answered back for the Big Red with her second of the game just 34 seconds later to make it 4-4 but that was as close as Cornell would come the rest of the afternoon.
Freshman Jillian Byers scored four goals in the 16-8 win over Cornell to give her 51 on the season. That’s the second-highest single season goal total ever for the Irish. Only Crysti Foote with 68 this season has more in one year.
|
|
Byers set up Orr’s second goal of the game at 14:56 and McKinney scored twice at 14:27 and 9:22 to build Notre Dame’s lead to 7-4. Byers closed out the first-half scoring with her third of the half with 5:20 left for an 8-4 Irish advantage. Notre Dame’s offense continued to fire on all cylinders in the second half. Foote (free-position goal) and Byers made it a 10-4 lead with 25:18 left in the game before Cornell broke the Irish run.
McKeown beat Dixon with a free-position shot with 24:12 left only to have Ferguson answer back at 19:04 off a great feed from Byers to make it 11-5.
The Big Red then scored twice to cut the Irish lead to 11-7 and maybe seize the momentum back. Dowd got her third of the game (free-position shot) at 18:07 and Baveye scored off a Charlotte Schmidlapp assist with 16:56 left to cut Notre Dame’s lead to four goals.
Cornell had two more chances to cut the lead but Baveye was wide right on a shot from the right wing and Jessica Wiegand fired high on a free-position chance with 12:34 left.
Following a goal by Foote (her third of the game) with 11:07 left, Dixon made big saves on Katherine Simmons and Dowd before the Irish would score four straight goals to build a 16-7 lead.
“Carol (Dixon) really played one of her best games this season. She made some big saves when we needed them. When Cornell scored the two goals in the second half to cut the lead to 11-7, they came right back and had another good chance and she made a big stop. I thought that just took them out of the game,” said Coyne.
McKinney (8:15), Ferguson (5:28), Foote (4:24) and Fox (4:02) closed out the Notre Dame scoring, building the lead to 16-7 before Dowd closed out her four-goal game with a marker with 1:33 left on the clock for the final of 16-8.
In the game, Notre Dame out shot Cornell, 29-26. Maggie Fava made eight saves for the Big Red in 53:05 of playing time. Mary Montague played 6:55 of the game and surrendered one goal while making no saves.
Notre Dame advances to the NCAA Quarterfinals for just the second time in the program’s 10-year history. In 2002, the Irish defeated Ohio State in the first round and then dropped an 11-5 decision on the road to top-seeded Princeton.
IRISH NOTES: ** Tracy Coyne on her 200th career victory: “I’ve been a part of several great teams in my career (two years at Denison, seven years at Roanoke and 10 years at Notre Dame) and have had a chance to win some big games. What sets this one apart is that I got it on our home field and in a big game in the NCAA Tournament.”
** With four goals in the game, Jillian Byers now has 51 on the year, making her just the third 50-goal scorer in Notre Dame history, joining Crysti Foote (68) and Lael O’Shaughnessy `01 (50). Her 73 points this season are the third-highest single season point total in Notre Dame history behind Foote (102) and Meredith Simon `04 (74) in 2004.
** Notre Dame’s defensive back line of Meaghan Fitzpatrick (Jr., Farmingdale, N.Y.), Becky Rank (So., Radnor, Pa.) and Kristin Hopson (Jr., Rosemont, Pa.) combined for nine ground balls, one draw control and five caused turnovers in the game.
** Notre Dame lost its’ regular-season game with Georgetown on April 15 in Washington, D.C. by an 11-10 score in sudden-death overtime. The two teams have played seven times in the all-time series with the Hoyas winning all seven meetings.
** Goalkeeper Carol Dixon made her 48th consecutive start for the Irish and has now played more games in goal (54) than any goalkeeper in the program’s history, passing Jen White’s `03 mark of 53 games. Her 14 wins pass White’s single-season best total of 13 and Dixon now has 29 career wins, just two behind White’s record of 31.
Game Summary 1 2 - F#10 Cornell (12-4) 4 4 - 8# 7 Notre Dame (14-3) 8 8 - 16
First-Half ScoringTime Team Score Goal Assist28:27 CU 0-1 Noelle Dowd (27)25:30 CU 0-2 Courtney Farrell (33)21:41 CU 0-3 Allison Schindler (15) Katherine Simmons (6)20:18 ND 3-1 * Crysti Foote (65) Free-position shot18:36 ND 3-2 * Kaki Orr (14) Free-position shot17:04 ND 3-3 Jillian Byers (48)15:59 ND 4-3 Jillian Byers (49) Crysti Foote (33)15:25 CU 4-4 Noelle Dowd (28)14:56 ND 5-4 Kaki Orr (15) Jillian Byers (21)14:27 ND 6-4 Caitlin McKinney (34) Mary Carpenter (9) 9:22 ND 7-4 * Caitlin McKinney (35) Free-position shot 5:20 ND 8-4 Jillian Byers (50)
Second-Half ScoringTime Team Score Goal Assist27:06 ND 9-4 * Crysti Foote (66) Free-position shot25:18 ND 10-4 Jillian Byers (51) Crysti Foote (34)24:12 CU 10-5 * Allison McKeown (16) Free-position shot19:04 ND 11-5 Heather Ferguson (21) Jillian Byers (22)18:07 CU 11-6 * Noelle Dowd (29) Free-position shot16:56 CU 11-7 Mimi Baveye (2) Charlotte Schmidlapp (3)11:07 ND 12-7 Crysti Foote (67) Heather Ferguson (11) 8:15 ND 13-7 Caitlin McKinney (36) Meghan Murphy (9) 5:28 ND 14-7 Heather Ferguson (22) 4:24 ND 15-7 Crysti Foote (68) 4:02 ND 16-7 Brittany Fox (8) 1:33 CU 16-8 Noelle Dowd (30)
* Free-position goal
GoalkeepersCornell - Maggie Fava (53:05 min.; 15 goals, 8 saves) Mary Montague (6:55 min.; 1 goal, 0 saves)Notre Dame - Carol Dixon (60:00 min.; 8 goals, 12 saves)
Shots: CU - 26; ND - 29Ground Balls: CU - 17; ND - 22Draw Controls: CU - 13; ND - 13Caused Turnovers: CU - 6; ND - 8