The Wheaton game followed a season-long trend: the game's location had to be changed because of poor playing conditions. The Jeffs and Lyons met on Babson College's turf field in Wellesley, Mass. Less than a week earlier, Babson had defeated Amherst; this time the Jeffs sent a message with a big win on the Beavers' turf.
Amherst scored early and scored often. In the beginning, the Jeffs' usual big guns paved the way. Their leading points scorer, quad-captain attacker Alyssa Briody '07, assisted on the first four goals of the game. Finishing Briody's feeds were sophomores Mary Noonan and Amy Craig with two goals apiece. Noonan then assisted Craig's third goal of the game and Amherst went up 5-0.
The Jeffs didn't slow down. They were relentless on attack and unyielding on defense. At halftime, the score was 13-0. In the 10 games prior to this one, the Jeffs had scored 13 goals or more only three times. When they reached the milestone after only half of the game had expired, Head Coach Chris Paradis was able to give everyone on the bench some experience.
With increased playing time against a weaker opponent, several Jeffs had career firsts. Sophomore Caki Guinee and first-years Tyler Tory-Murphy, Hannah Walker and Kathleen Scheld all scored the first two points of their careers. Tory-Murphy had a goal and an assist while the rest scored a pair of goals apiece. In addition, newly-acquired goalie Lili Ferguson '10 made her first game appearance. She recently joined the team after surgery on a broken thumb forced junior goalie Kathleen Boucher to the sidelines. "It was great to see everyone be able to play in the game; first-time point-getters just had such big smiles on their faces," said senior attacker Dana Kuper. "Hopefully there will be a lot more of that in the future."
Ferguson and starting goalie Linda McEvoy '08 nearly combined for the shutout (a very rare occurrence in lacrosse), but the Lyons were able to tally two goals in the second half. Craig was Amherst's most prolific scorer, netting a total of five goals and adding an assist. Briody's point total was the mirror image of Craig's with a goal and five assists. Kuper scored twice and added three assists for five points. Quad-captain midfielder Lauren Dudley '07 had a hat trick and classmate Liz Wise added two assists. "The best part about the Wheaton game was that our whole team got into the game," Wise explained. ". Everyone on our team is so talented, so it was nice to see everyone put the skills that we see in practice every day into use in a game setting."
"Our Willams game put us in a really good mindset for Wheaton," added Craig. "We had a lot of confidence going into the game and were able to control the pace of the game from the start."
But that momentum didn't carry into the weekend. Based on conference play, the Jeffs are better than the Bowdoin Polar Bears. Amherst had a 5-1 NESCAC record before Saturday's game while Bowdoin was a mere 2-4. This season, however, is a bit of an anomaly for the Bowdoin squad. The Polar Bears finished second in the 2006 NESCAC Tournament and have been a top-tier team in the conference and nation the past few years. Indeed, Saturday was the fourth time in five games that Amherst lost to Bowdoin, and the Jeffs' only win over the Polar Bears in the last three seasons was in overtime.
"Bowdoin's a strong team and has definitely given us trouble these past couple of years," said Wise. "In many ways we gave them too much respect, and as a result, we held back too much on 50-50 balls, instead of going at them like we would with other teams."
Bowdoin came out on fire, scoring the first four goals of the game. Goals by Briody and Craig cut Amherst's deficit in half, but the Polar Bears stretched their lead back out to four by the end of the half. Bowdoin took a 7-2 to open the second half. A pair of goals by Noonan sparked a 20-minute period where the Bowdoin's lead kept changing from four goals to three goals and back. With the score at 10-7, Wise contributed an unassisted goal. However, with 4:09, Bowdoin scored what proved to be the game-winner. Wise added her second tally of the game with 1:22 remaining and attacker Maddie Hoeg '08 scored with 35 ticks on the clock, but time ran out on Amherst's comeback.
"We know we can beat them, but we just have to come out with confidence and play to our potential," said Wise. "We're very evenly matched, so it becomes a matter of which team executes best in the game. Bowdoin's definitely become a new rival for us, and I have no doubt we'll be seeing them again."
With the playoffs starting this Sunday, the Jeffs were hoping to head into the postseason with some steam. "It was a disappointing loss," said McEvoy. "We were feeling as though we were in an upswing, and then this game just wasn't up to the level we had been working towards. It unfortunately felt like a step backwards, and not forwards, which is where we need to be heading going into the postseason. We will have to kick it up a notch if we want to go far in the coming weeks."
But Amherst was unable to rebound from the loss. Yesterday, the Jeffs lost to Tufts University 13-7 in what was a must-win for the Jumbos. This was the first time Amherst lost to Tufts since 1997. Ir was the second time this season the Jeffs have dropped consecutive games after avoided back-to-back losses for seven years.
Amherst's final regular season game is on Saturday at Colby College. The first round of the NESCAC Tournament begins on Sunday.
NESCAC Notes
With some thanks to Williams, the Jeffs are still in a good position in the NESCAC. The Ephs lost their second NESCAC game and third overall game in a row when they fell to visiting Trinity College. As a result, Williams has dropped to fourth in the conference with a 4-3 reocrd, while Amherst and Trinity are now tied for second at 5-3. Amherst won the head-to-head matchup over the Bantams earlier this season.
Middlebury is 8-0 in the NESCAC and has secured the top seed in the tournament. Connecticut College has yet to win a conference game, and along with Bates College, will not play in the postseason. The rest is a bit more complicated. There are three teams with identical 4-4 NESCAC records. Amherst, Trinity and Williams are just ahead of that pack, while Tufts is right below at 3-5. Only the top seven teams play in the NESCAC Tournament, and games today and Saturday will determine the seeding.