The women's lacrosse team and the UMass Minutewomen were taunted and tussled by Mother Nature's blustery bite as the two teams duked it out to a 13-8 Big Green victory at Chase Field yesterday afternoon.
With the home-opener win, the Big Green improved to 6-1 on the season.
The Minutewomen fired the opening musketball 14 seconds into the match as sophomore Laura Korutz snagged the ball after the face-off and ran a bee-line straight to the Dartmouth net.
But the Big Green lit the scoreboard 30 seconds later with a shot of their own Dartmouth's assist-leader Jen Greene '98 burned down the left flank and centered a pass to tri-Captain Kelly Hannigan '97, who clocked it past UMass freshman Megan Haggerty into the net.
As freshman attack Emily Fenwick and Greene rushed in with two more tallies for the Big Green, the game looked like it was going be a blowout.
But UMass would allow nothing of the sort.
The Minutewomen evened the score with three consecutive netters, including one off a free-position shot.
For the remainder of the first half, the score flip-flopped as the Big Green got called on stick-checking penalties every time they lifted their sticks.
In the closing two minutes of the half, rookie Jacque Weitzel '00 tossed in her third goal of the game and tri-Captain Kim Mendelson '97 slapped one in to give Dartmouth an 8-6 advantage at the break.
In the second stanza, the Big Green could do no wrong as they busted out to a 13-6 lead off a five-goal run.
"In the first half, the refs called it really tough," Hannigan said. "So in the second half, we just started to work more as a team and we focused on just taking the ball to the net."
Weitzel only needed two seconds to start the scoring spree as she bounced in her fourth goal of the day to cap off a rush from the midfield face-off.
Mendelson followed with two consecutive netters, while Julia Morrill '98 and Dune Thorne '98 each followed with one goal apiece. Greene earned the assist on both plays. She now leads the team with 18 assists.
UMass rallied at the 17-minute mark as Rebecca Minaker and Jennifer Herker each found the net. But that was all either team would do for the day as the cold weather kept all the players numb and scoreless for the final 10 minutes of play.
Weitzel led the Big Green in scoring with four goals on the day, while Greene continued to prove her play-making flair with three assists.
In the Dartmouth net, Sarah Carlson '99 had five saves while Lauren Carroll '00 grabbed one during her 12-minute stint wearing the pads.
"Overall, we're happy about the win," Mendelson said. "But we know we could've played a lot better out there today. We have a lot of big games coming up and we just can't afford to let lesser teams toy with us."
The Big Green travels to Ithaca, NY on Saturday to play the Cornell Big Red, before returning to Hanover to play three big home games next week against No. 7 James Madison, No. 8 Yale and No. 12 Brown.
