Aggies maintain winning streak with 15-14 win over Hoyas
Despite a slow start at the UC Davis Health Stadium on Sunday afternoon, the UC Davis Lacrosse team quickly picked up the pace in the second half to claim a 15-14 win over the Georgetown Hoyas. The Aggies were coming off a 14-8 win against the University of Oregon, and managed to maintain their momentum through Sunday’s game.
The Aggies lagged behind Georgetown for the first 20 minutes of action. After the Hoyas recorded two quick scores to open the contest, senior midfielder Kate Graham scored the Aggies’ first goal about eight minutes into the first half. The Hoyas then built a six-goal lead, thanks to their aggressive style of play off of the draw and strong defense in front of their own goal. Georgetown rattled off four straight goals over a two and a half-minute span to push the score to 8-2.
“We were turning the ball over — unforced turnovers, just bad passes,” said head coach Suzanne Isidor regarding the team’s sluggish start. “Defensively, we just felt like our footwork was a little bit off or our hips weren’t turned the way that we want. We weren’t forcing them [Georgetown] to do what we wanted to force them to do, we were letting them do what they wanted to do.”
After adjusting their strategy, the Aggies hit a turning point with a second goal by Graham. After that, the Aggies went on to score four of the game’s next five goals thanks in large part to a pair from freshman midfielder Alex Agnew and another by junior attacker Kaley Stunz in the waning seconds of the half. UC Davis went into the halftime trailing just 10-8, down only two goals.
The second half began with a quick Hoya score, but another tandem of goals from Agnew and two from senior attacker Sorana Larson eventually evened things up at 12 apiece with just over 11 minutes remaining.
With eight minutes to go, sophomore midfielder Natalie Wilson put one in the back of the net to give the Aggies a one goal lead — their first of the game. But the Hoya’s responded just 40 seconds later to tie the game once again.
After another three and a half minutes of back and forth play, a deciding shot by junior midfielder Mar Alvear put the Aggies up 15-14. From there the team played defensive with freshman goalkeeper Ashley Liang stopping a crucial shot by Georgetown just as the game ended, sealing the win for UC Davis.
One of the team’s key players during the game was Agnew, who led the Aggies with four goals on the afternoon. Isidor praised her for having “an awesome day” that was instrumental to the team’s success.
“She’s a freshman that just keeps getting better and better, every time she steps on the field,” Isidor said. “She’s getting better and better and she’s still untapped potential. She had a great game.”
Larson also had herself a four-point day, recording a trio of goals and an assist, while Graham added in a hat trick of her own.
Despite the rough start to the game the Aggies were able to adjust their plays to be more aggressive and gain the momentum needed to end the game strong.
“We started a little bit slow,” Isidor said. “I think Georgetown is such a good team and they capitalized on some of our mistakes that we were making. They weren’t huge mistakes, but they were little things and Georgetown was capitalizing, and we dug ourselves in that 8-2 hole. It was quite a climb out. We just tried to focus on the moment — and just one moment, one play at a time. And next thing you know, we were up.”
After a wednesday tilt against George Mason, the Aggies were slated to take on Yale this Sunday at the UC Davis Health Stadium, but UC Davis athletics has since suspended all competition due to the COVID-19 novel coronavirus outbreak.
Written by: Priya Reddy — sports@theaggie.org
