MONTEVALLO, Ala. – The Lander women's lacrosse team collected its third straight win and sixth in the last seven games with a commanding 18-11 victory against Montevallo on Saturday to close the regular season.
Lander concludes this portion of the year with a 12-3 overall record and a 3-1 mark in Gulf South play. Both the .800 overall winning percentage and .750 conference winning percentage are new program-highs.
Brooke Kelly set a new career-high with seven goals this afternoon, and her eight points tied a career-best set earlier this season versus Converse on Feb. 8.
Ella Benson stayed hot with four more goals against the Falcons to push her total to 11 over the last three games.
Kylie Fragala and
Izzy Olson tacked on a pair of goals apiece, and Olson won 10 draw controls – eclipsing her previous best of seven at Converse a season ago.
The other Bearcat scorers were
Amelia McCauley,
Caroline Nicholson and
Sophie Warren.
Kaia Morey helped the defensive side with three caused turnovers and four draw controls while
Zoe Cotheran played a career-high 37 minutes in goal.
The Blue and Gold blended offense and defense from the start as they had six goals in the first quarter and shutout UM over the first 15 minutes; Kelly completed her hat-trick just before time expired in the quarter.
Montevallo, though, rebounded with a 7-2 second quarter to make it 8-7 Bearcats at halftime. The game was tied at nine early in the third before Lander put the clamps down and scored four straight to grab a 13-9 lead.
McCauley, Kelly, Warren and Benson had goals during the stretch, and
Mickey Burnett collected assists on the first two.
The Bearcats shut out the Falcons 5-0 in the fourth to salt the game away.
Lander dominated several statistical categories, including a 32-20 edge in shots, a 21-13 margin in shots on goal, all the while grabbing 21 of the game's 31 draw controls.
Next up for the Bearcats is a rematch with Alabama-Huntsville in the GSC semifinals on Friday, April 25 at the Loretta P. Spencer Sports Complex in Huntsville. Lander beat UAH 13-12 on the road earlier this week.
