LAKEWOOD, N.J. - - A four-goal run midway through the second half brought the Wilmington University women's lacrosse team to within one, but Georgian Court held on for a 14-11 Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference victory on a cooler, overcast Saturday afternoon.
The goal of the Wildcats (5-2, 2-1 CACC) is to be playing at Georgian Court University (5-1, 4-0 CACC) at the end of the season in the CACC Tournament. Today they proved they can get there and play with anyone in the conference by hanging with the two-time defending CACC Tournament champions.
The Wildcats sprinted out to a 2-0 lead after Jessica Graybeal and Jaclyn Hall scored unassisted goals to take the early lead. The Lions came back to tie the game with two straight goals of their own and the two programs traded goals back and forth from there in the first half.
Georgian Court broke a 6-6 tie with 1:02 remaining before the halftime break as Corinne Coyle tallied her third goal of the game as the Lions went into the break leading by one.
The Lions continued to pour in the goals to open the second half, scoring the first four goals of the second frame, making it six straight goals overall, to go ahead 11-6 with 21:01 left on the scoreboard.
The Wildcats didn't lie down against the team the CACC coaches picked to finish second in the preseason poll, however, rallying to score the next four goals to cut the deficit to within one.
Stratton took a feed from Kory Webster and score to make it 11-7 with 20:27 to play to kick-start the four-goal run. Megan Keffer tallied her second goal of the game off the bench for the Wildcats to cut it to a three-goal game 36 seconds later, keeping the pressure on the home team.
Meggan Apgar kept the comeback bid rolling with a goal off a pass from Rebecca Guethler at the 18:10 mark of the second stanza. After an eight-minute gap where the score remained the same, Jaclyn Hall broke through with her second goal of the game to make it 11-10 with just over 10 minutes left to play in the game.
The teams went on another four-minute goal scoring lull and the next goal would prove costly to each team's momentum in the contest. The Lions' Emily Gialanella snapped the Wildcats' four-goal stretch with her fourth goal of the season, all but breaking any chances for the visitors. Samantha Shaw scored the next two goals for the Lions to extend the lead back out to four at 14-10 with 3:07 left in regulation.
Webster tallied the Wildcats' final goal of the afternoon on a pass from Liz Case with 16 seconds left to play, but it was too little too late as the Lions escaped with the key early season CACC victory.
Jaclyn Hall, Webster and Keffer all tallied two goals each to lead the Wildcats while Liz Case scored a goal and added two assists to tally three points. Webster also added an assist to match Case's team high three points. Molly Taylor, Graybeal, Apgar, and Stratton also added one goal apiece to round out the Wilmington scoring.
Georgian Court's goalkeeper Amanda Cathcart made six saves in goal to improve to 5-1 on the season while Kaitlyn Hall recorded 10 stops in goal for the Wildcats.
GCU's Shaw led all scorers with four goals and an assist while Coyle also tallied a hat trick with three goals on the afternoon.
The Wildcats return to action on Thursday, March 29 when they welcome Philadelphia to the Kirkwood Soccer Complex for another pivotal CACC matchup. The game is slated for a 4:00 p.m. start.