Women's Lacrosse tops Norwich; evens GNAC record at 1-1

(Northfield, Vt.) The Rivier University Women's Lacrosse team earned an important Great Northeast Athletic Conference victory this afternoon as they defeated Norwich University, 11-8 on the road at Norwich's Sabine Field.

The Raiders pick up its first conference win of the season to improve 1-1 in the GNAC and 4-4 on the year, while Norwich falls to 0-2 in league play and 3-4 overall.

Senior midfielder Paxton LaRocque (Londonderry, N.H.) led the Raiders with eight points on five goals and three assists on 14 shots to go with the four ground balls and two caused turnovers. Junior Amanda Wickens (Tyngsboro, Mass.) added three goals on six shots and won six draw controls, while senior Jocelyn Park (Londonderry, N.H.) recorded a pair of goals and sophomore Taylor Lirakis (Tewksbury, Mass.) getting credited with a goal and an assist.

Freshman Kathryn Albretsen (Caldwell, N.J.) led the Cadets with five points after collecting a hat trick and a pair of assists on seven shots along with three draw controls and three ground balls. Junior Chapel Guarnieri (Pepperell, Mass.) also recorded a hat trick on seven shots and forced five turnovers with five ground balls and two draw controls, while freshman Janae Somero (St. Albans, Vt.) added a goal and an assist with senior Caroline Manning (Duxbury, Mass.) picking up a goal with three caused turnovers.

The first half was a tight contested game as both teams got on the board early within seven minutes of the opening draw. Neither team would get a comfortable lead as both sides traded goals that would tie up the game five consecutive times before LaRocque scored Rivier's sixth goal with just seven seconds remaining in the stanza for the Raiders' 6-5 lead at the break.

The Raiders got a two-point lead after scoring their seventh goal in just 66 seconds into the second half before Albretsen fed a pass from behind to Somero, who then chipped in the ball into the back of the net before Albrestsen scored unassisted less than six minutes later to tie up the contest at seven goals apiece. The Cadets would get its first lead of the half as Albretsen scored her third and final goal for the 8-7 advantage but the Raiders would quickly respond with four unanswered goals in the final 18:35 of the game and walk away with the 11-8 win.

Freshman goalie Janice Bolton (Stow, Mass.) came up with 12 saves on 23 shots for Norwich. The Cadets managed to clear the ball 18-of-33 times and won eight draw controls and forced 17 Rivier turnovers in the loss. For Rivier, freshman Courtney Laperriere (Keene, N.H.) played all 60 minutes in between the pipes and stopped six shots from going in as the Raiders converted just 16 of the 23 clear attempts but managed to get 33 total shots off and scored three free position goals out of nine attempts.

Rivier will enjoy some time off as they will return to action on April 7th at Regis College. Norwich is back in action on Tuesday, March 5 as the Cadets host University of St. Joseph (Conn.) for the 7:00 p.m. GNAC contest.