April 29, 2006
Notre Dame, Ind. – Throughout the 2006 season, senior Crysti Foote (Sr., Suffern, N.Y.) has been Notre Dame’s go-to-guy when they needed a big goal. On Saturday, the Tewaaraton Trophy candidate scored five times versus Syracuse, but it was sophomore Heather Ferguson (So., Newtown Square, Pa.) and junior Meghan Murphy (Jr., Centennial, Colo.) who came up with the big goals to lead the Irish to an 11-10 BIG EAST win versus the visiting Orange.
Ferguson, who had a career-high three goals in the game, scored on a free-position shot with 5:54 left in the game to tie the score at 10-10. She then set up Murphy’s game-winning goal off a free-position shot with 2.3 seconds left on the clock. Ferguson was fouled as she drove to the goal with time winding down. Off the free shot she found Murphy to her left inside the circle and the Murphy whipped a shot past Syracuse goalkeeper Jennifer Kasel as time ran out to give the Irish the win.
The victory improved Notre Dame to 12-3 on the season and gave the Irish sole possession of second place in the BIG EAST with a 4-1 record. Syracuse slipped to 9-6 overall and 2-3 in conference play.
Foote’s five goals on the afternoon give her 60 for the season. Jane Stoeckert (Fr., Mendham, N.J.) and Caitlin McKinney (So., Lafayette Hill, Pa.) joined Ferguson and Murphy on the scoresheet. Syracuse was led by Gaddy Fortune who scored three goals in the game. Kathryn Rowan added two; Jill DePetris scored once and added two assists while Melody Agnew, Bridget Looney, Kristin Brady and Shari Appollon had single goals for the Orange.
Notre Dame jumped out to a 4-0 lead over the first seven-and-a-half minutes of the game. Jillian Byers set up Stoeckert just over three minutes into the game to give the Irish a 1-0 lead. Byers then picked up her second assist of the game when she found Foote in front for her first of the game just 19 seconds later at 26:32.
The Irish then converted a pair of free-position shots with McKinney (23:44) and Ferguson (22:31) giving Notre Dame a 4-0 lead.
Syracuse then ran off five of the next six goals to tie the game at 5-5. Rowan got the Orange on the scoreboard with her first goal of the game at 20:44. DePetris cut the lead to 4-2 at 12:58 only to see Foote answer at 11:23 to get the Irish lead back to three goals at 5-2.
DePetris set up Agnew at 7:13 to cut the Notre Dame lead to 5-3. Fortune’s first goal of the day at 3:02 made it a one-goal game at 5-4 and Brady capped the Syracuse run, scoring with 2:04 left in the half for a 5-5 tie.
It looked like the score would stay tied at halftime but the Irish quickly rushed the ball downfield where Ferguson was fouled with 1.3 seconds left on the clock. Her free-position goal as time ran out in the first half gave Notre Dame a 6-5 lead at the half.
Syracuse opened the second half with Rowan scoring just 38 seconds into the half to even the score at 6-6. Foote answered with two goals, the first a free-position goal (24:38) and the second off a Kaki Orr (Jr., Darien, Conn.) assist at 20:22, for an 8-6 Irish lead.
Goalkeeper Carol Dixon makes a big stop on Syracuse’s Gaddy Fortune late in the second half.
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The Orange then scored the next three goals. Fortune scored her second goal of the game with 17:42 left and Looney tied the game at 8-8 off a DePetris assist with 16:58. Syracuse would take its first lead of the game at 12:07 of the half when Appollon grabbed a ground ball in the defensive zone and raced the length of the field to beat Carol Dixon (Sr., Pennsauken, N.J.) for a 9-8 Syracuse lead.
Foote tied the game with 9:18 left on a hustle play. First she tracked down and errant Irish shot behind the Syracuse goal. She carried the ball behind the cage and moved in front, beating Kasel with a turning shot for her fifth goal of the game.
Fortune would put Syracuse ahead, 10-9, just over a minute later with her third shot. The Syracuse scoring leader would have two more great chances in the half, but was stopped by Dixon once on a drive to the goal and one off a free-position shot.
That set up Ferguson’s free-position shot wit 5:54 to tie the game and Murphy’s last second shot that gave the Irish the 11-10 win.
Notre Dame out shot Syracuse on the afternoon by a 28-25 margin. Kasel made 14 saves for the Orange, including 10 in the first half to keep Syracuse in the game. Dixon had nine saves for the day, including the two big stops on Fortune late in the game.
The Irish will close out the regular season on Sunday, May 7 when they play host to the Vanderbilt Commodores in a 12:00 noon contest at Moose Krause Stadium. Notre Dame will honor its senior class on Senior Day in their final home game of the season.
IRISH NOTES:
** With 11 goals in the game, Notre Dame set a new season goal-scoring mark. The Irish now have 215 goals on the year. The previous record was 206 and was set in 2004.
** With three draw controls in the game, Crysti Foote now has 41 this season to set the Notre Dame single-season mark for draw controls. The previous mark was 40 and was set by current Irish assistant coach Alissa Moser `02 who did it in 2001.
** Notre Dame won the draw control battle versus Syracuse by an 18-4 margin. The Irish won all 12 draw contols in the first half.
** The Irish scored five goals on nine free-position chances versus the Orange. That equals the season high as the Irish were 5-for-8 versus James Madison on March 12.
Game Summary 1 2 - F#13 Syracuse (9-6/2-3) 5 5 10# 7 Notre Dame (12-3/4-1) 5 8 13
First-Half ScoringTime Team Score Goal Assist26:51 ND 1-0 Jane Stoeckert (10) Jillian Byers26:32 ND 2-0 Crysti Foote (56) Jillian Byers23:44 ND 3-0 * Caitlin McKinney (33) Free-position shot22:31 ND 4-0 * Heather Ferguson (16) Free-position shot20:44 SU 4-1 Kathryn Rowan (42)12:58 SU 4-2 Jill DePetris (15)11:23 ND 5-2 Crysti Foote (57) 7:13 SU 5-3 Melody Agnew (8) Jill DePetris 3:02 SU 5-4 Gaddy Fortune (44) 2:04 SU 5-5 Kristin Brady (12) 0:00 ND 6-5 * Heather Ferguson (17) Free-position shot
Second-Half ScoringTime Team Score Goal Assist29:22 SU 6-6 Kathryn Rowan (43)24:38 ND 7-6 * Crysti Foote (58) Free-position shot20:22 ND 8-6 Crysti Foote (59) Kaki Orr17:42 SU 8-7 Gaddy Fortune (45)16:58 SU 8-8 Bridget Looney (6) Jill DePetris12:07 SU 8-9 Shari Appollon (4) 9:18 ND 9-9 Crysti Foote (60) 8:12 SU 9-10 Gaddy Fortune (46) 5:54 ND 10-10 * Heather Ferguson (18) Free-position shot 0:00 ND 11-10 Meghan Murphy (14) Heather Ferguson
* Free-position goal
GoalkeepersSyracuse - Jennifer Kasel (60:00 min.; 11 goals, 14 saves)Notre Dame - Carol Dixon (60:00 min.; 10 goals, 9 saves)
Shots: SU - 25; ND - 28Ground Balls: SU - 20; ND - 13Draw Controls: SU - 4; ND - 18Caused Turnovers: SU - 5; ND - 10