April 17, 2010
Notre Dame, Ind. – The Notre Dame women’s lacrosse team ran its winning streak to four games on Saturday afternoon as the Irish handed Cincinnati a 15-5 BIG EAST loss in the home finale at Arlotta Stadium.
Senior attack All-American Gina Scioscia turned in her top performance of the season as she scored three goals, including the 100th of her Notre Dame career and added four assists for a seven-point afternoon. Also scoring three times in the game were junior Shaylyn Blaney and freshman Jenny Granger. Kailene Abt added a pair of goals while Ansley Stewart, Kate Newall, Maggie Tamasitis and Jackie Doherty had single goals for the Irish.
Cincinnati got three goals from its top scorer, Laura Simanski while Natalie Starvaggi and Katie Kiriazoglou scored once each for the Bearcats.
The win improves the 12th-ranked Irish to 9-4 overall and 5-1 in the BIG EAST, good for second place, one game behind front-runner, Georgetown. For Cincinnati the loss was the fifth in a row for the Bearcats as they fall to 4-8 on the year and 0-4 in conference play.
Prior to the start of the game, Notre Dame honored its senior class of 2010 – Scioscia, defender Rachel Guerrera and midfielder Maggie Zentgraf – and it didn’t take long for Scioscia to get her team off on the right track.
The talented playmaker set up Tamasitis just one minute into the game with a pass from behind the net that the sophomore quickly deposited behind Bearcat goalkeeper Katherine Russo for the 1-0 lead to start the Irish on a 9-0 run over the first 14:37 of the game.
Blaney, a force at both ends of the field, scored her first of three just 24 seconds later on a free-position shot. Besides a three-goal game, the talented midfielder and All-American candidate had six ground balls, four draw controls and set a Notre Dame single-game record with seven caused turnovers on the afternoon.
Abt and Scioscia scored twice each in the 9-0 run with Stewart, Granger and Doherty each scoring once with Doherty’s goal with 15:23 left in the half, making the score 9-0. Scioscia’s second goal of the game at 23:47 that made the score 6-0 was the 100th of her career, making her just the eighth player in the program’s history to reach 100 goals in their career.
The Bearcats finally broke through on freshman goalkeeper Ellie Hilling as Simanski broke up the shutout bid with 15:09 left in the half, scoring unassisted to make it 9-1.
Granger answered back with her second of the afternoon with an assist to Megan Sullivan at 13:29 to make it 10-1 and Scioscia’s third of the half gave the Irish an 11-1 lead.
Simanski scored the final goal of the half with 5:20 left as she converted a feed from MacKenzie Parsons to make it 11-2 at the half. Notre Dame out shot Cincinnati, 22-9, in the opening half. The 11 goals for the Irish marked the third time this season that Notre Dame had scored 10 or more goals in the first half.
The Irish got out of the gates quickly in the second half, scoring the first three goals of the half with Blaney getting two of the three tallies. She cashed in a nice set up from Scioscia at 29:35 to make it 12-2 and following a nice one-on-one play by Granger for her first career hat trick, Blaney cashed in a feed from Stewart at 21:47 for a 14-2 lead.
The Bearcats would score three of the final four goals of the night. Starvaggi converted a free-position shot at 17:50 for her only goal of the night.
Newall then closed out the Irish scoring as she took a feed from Scioscia and fired a shot that the Bearcat goalkeeper stopped but broke through and rolled over the goal line for Notre Dame’s 15th goal of the game.
Kiriazoglou scored her goal at 9:31 and Simanski closed out her hat trick with 1:54 left in the game on a free-position shot. Her goal came versus sophomore Kristin DeRespiris, a converted defender, who was making her first appearance in goal for her Notre Dame career.
The Irish out shot Cincinnati, 31-10, in the game. Russo finished with nine saves for the Bearcats while giving up 13 goals. Haley Marvine played 1:59 of the contest and gave up two goals while making a pair of saves. Hilling gave up four goals for Notre Dame while making a pair of saves. DeRespiris played the final 2:17 of the game and surrendered one goal.
Over the last three games – Villanova (16-0), Syracuse (6-5) and Cincinnati (15-5) – the Irish have given up just 10 goals for a 3.33 per game average.
Notre Dame closes out the season with its final three games on the road. That will begin on Thursday, April 22 when the Irish travel to Ohio State for a 5:00 p.m. game versus the Buckeyes at Jesse Owens Stadium in Columbus, Ohio.
GAME SUMMARY 1 2 - FCincinnati (4-8/0-4) 2 3 - 5#12 Notre Dame (9-4/5-1) 11 4 - 15
ScoringFirst Half:Time Team Score Goal Assist29:00 ND 1-0 Maggie Tamasitis Gina Scioscia28:36 ND 2-0 Shaylyn Blaney Free-position shot27:26 ND 3-0 Kailene Abt26:50 ND 4-0 Gina Scioscia24:38 ND 5-0 Ansley Stewart Gina Sciosia (2)23:47 ND 6-0 Gina Scioscia (2)22:39 ND 7-0 Kailene Abt Free-position shot20:37 ND 8-0 Jenny Granger15:23 ND 9-0 Jackie Doherty Free-position shot15:09 UC 9-1 Laura Simanski13:29 ND 10-1 Jenny Granger (2) Megan Sullivan 7:42 ND 11-1 Gina Scioscia (3) 5:20 UC 11-2 Laura Simanski (2) MacKenzie Parsons
Second HalfTime Team Score Goal Assist29:35 ND 12-2 Shaylyn Blaney (2) Gina Scioscia (3)25:42 ND 13-2 Jenny Granger (2)21:47 ND 14-2 Shaylyn Blaney (3) Ansley Stewart17:50 UC 14-3 Natalie Starvaggi Free-position shot11:59 ND 15-3 Kate Newall Gina Scioscia (4) 9:31 UC 15-4 Katie Kiriazoglou 1:54 UC 15-5 Laura Shimanski (3) Free-position shot
Goalkeepers:Cincinnati: Katherine Russo (58:01 min; 13 goals against; 9 saves) Haley Marvine (1:59 min; 2 goals against, 2 saves)Notre Dame: Ellie Hilling (57:43 min; 4 goals against; 2 saves) Kristin DeRespiris (2:17 min; 1 goal against; 0 saves)
Total Shots: Cincinnati: 10, Notre Dame: 31Ground Balls: Cincinnati: 21, Notre Dame: 20Draw Controls: Cincinnati: 9, Notre Dame: 13Caused Turnovers: Cincinnati: 10, Notre Dame 19