Cornell came in red-hot while the Bearcats fell flat in the snow during Tuesday’s women’s lacrosse game at home. Despite Binghamton’s overwhelming 24-1 conference victory over Hartford three days earlier, the team failed to capitalize offensively in the 15-7 loss against the Big Red (7-6, 2-3 Ivy). Both the Bearcats (6-8, 3-2 America East) and the Big Red started out the game strong, but Binghamton was unable to keep its momentum going late in the second half.
“I thought yesterday we came out with a solid game plan, but unfortunately didn’t take care of some little details for the entire 60 minutes,” said BU head coach Stephanie Allen. “I think defensively we gave ourselves a good opportunity and put some high pressure on them that potentially they weren’t expecting. We had some good saves from [sophomore goalie] Taylor Passuello that gave us some extra opportunities on the offensive end as well. We just need to make sure we are capitalizing on that when we do get the ball down in the offensive end.”
An early surge from Cornell had the Bearcats down by two in less than five minutes of playing time. Redshirt senior attack Brianne Arthur quickly answered the second goal as well as Cornell’s third, bringing the score to 3-2 from an assist from senior midfielder Jacqueline Kennedy. Kennedy then switched roles by scoring her first goal of the game to tie the score with a little over 18 minutes left in the first half. Freshman attack Paige Volkmann was able to score Binghamton’s only remaining goal of the period, but another Big Red run ended the frame with a score of 7-4.
After the snow caused a delayed start to the second half of play, both teams began getting fired up as the Big Red and the Bearcats traded back and forth for two goals each, as Kennedy netted her second of the afternoon and senior attack Tiffany Ryan followed to keep it a three-goal game.
In the remaining 15 minutes of the match, Cornell was able to dominate offensively, scoring five consecutive goals before Arthur interrupted the Big Red streak by finding the back of the net for her third and final time on Tuesday with slightly over five minutes remaining. One final tally by Cornell powered the final score to 15-7.
Despite the discrepancy in goals, the near-even 29-28 shot difference favoring Cornell demonstrated the competitiveness of the game, but also Binghamton’s struggles in taking advantage of offensive breaks. Both teams were also almost evenly matched in terms of ground balls, as Cornell topped BU by only two, winning the battle 24-22. With the help of junior midfielder Rebecca Golderman, who captured five draw controls throughout the game, the Bearcats were able to tie Cornell for draw controls at 12 apiece.
“I thought we had a good response in the second half in the draw control area, [we] really competed hard for the 50/50 balls out there, but lacked some execution with our shooting in the second half on the offensive end, and a couple things defensively that we’ll clean up before Saturday,” Allen said.
Although the game’s result wasn’t what the home crowd was hoping for, there was one bright spot for the fans in attendance. Due to the donation of an anonymous donor, admission to Tuesday’s game was completely free, allowing fans to enjoy the contest without having to open their wallets.
With just two conference games left to play in the regular season, the Bearcats are planning on using this game as a learning experience to improve and prepare for the end of the season and beyond.
“Our focus continues to be on us, and improving day to day,” Allen said. “We don’t have big changes that we need to make, we just need to take care of fine-tuning a few things on both sides of the ball.”
The Bearcats are set to face off against UMass Lowell in a conference matchup at Cushing Field Complex in Lowell, Massachusetts on Saturday at 6 p.m.