Saints Fall In Season-Opener

March 16: The St. Lawrence women's lacrosse team opened its 2007 season on Friday afternoon falling to Nazareth 12-7. Nazareth, who tallied just one loss in 2006 and won the Empire 8 with a 6-0 record, opened the game strong taking a 4-0 lead with just under 11 minutes left in the first half. The Saints could not stop Nazareth senior attack Beth Quartier, who led her team with seven points, three goals and four assists. Quartier was involved in all of the Golden Flyers' first four goals, assisting three goals and scoring one.

The Saints answered with 10:11 left left in the first period when senior Kathryn Durki found the back of the net for an unassisted goal to tighten Nazareth's score to 4-1. The Golden Flyers put one more on the net with just more than a minute left in the first half. Senior Tia Morgia added a goal to make the halftime score 5-1.

The Saints had just three shots on goal in the first half, one of which was Durki's score, while the Golden Flyers put Saints goalkeeper Becky Timbers to work, taking 15 shots in the first half.

Head coach Jodi Axtell said her team was sluggish in the first half and looked out of sync.

"We really had a case of the first-game jitters," Axtell said.

The Saints started the second half strong, opening with a goal just four minutes into the second half. Senior Shannon Garrett put one past Nazareth goalkeepter Maria Fusco to tighten the score to 5-2.

That is as close as the Saints would get. Nazareth rattled off six unanswered goal, four in just three minutes, to stretch their lead to 9-2. Quartier scored her second goal of the afternoon to spark the Golden Flyers' run with 24:09 left in the game. Just more than a minute later, freshman Jennifer Young scored on a free position shot. Jessica McArdle picked up the third unanswered goal for the Golden Flyers just 20 seconds later and Young cashed in her second goal of the afternoon with 21:26 remaining in the game.

Axtell said that run by the Golden Flyers hurt her team's momentum.

"That was it," Axtell said. "We started out well in the second half, but when they came out and scored four in just a couple of minutes, it was really hard for us to rebound from that."

Nazareth added two more goals, making the score 11-2, before the Saints responded with a goal of their own. With 15:07 left to play, junior Alanna Waters scored off a pass from Durki to make the score 11-3.

Nazareth answered two minutes later with their final score of the afternoon before St. Lawrence scored four unanswered goals to close out the game.

Freshman Julie Wooters scored with 9:07 left to play when she took a pass from senior Patty Ball and put it in the back of the net. Just a minute later, freshman Lexi Wisnowski scored off a pass from senior Shannon Garrett. The Saints added their final two goals eight minutes later when Durki scored her second goal of the afternoon with 2:26 to play. Freshman Mary Jane Sweetland scored the final goal of the game off an assist from Durki, her second of the contest, with 2:05 remaining.

The Saints will have to rebound from Friday's loss quickly as they head to Florida this weekend for their spring trip. They will take on Wellesley on March 20 in Florida before returning home next weekend for two Liberty League contests against Union and Skidmore Colleges.