Mountain Hawks earn 9-5 win over Rutgers

BETHLEHEM, Pa. - The Lehigh women's lacrosse team jumped out to an 8-2 halftime lead and withstood Rutgers' second-half comeback attempt to earn an impressive 9-5 win on Tuesday evening at the Ulrich Sports Complex. With the win, Lehigh improves to 9-2 on the season with five regular season games remaining, all Patriot League contests. Sophomore Haley Wentzel led the offense with three goals and one assist while junior Allison LaBeau tallied two goals and two assists.

"We're excited to win," said Lehigh head coach Jill Redfern. "Rutgers is a tough opponent, an athletic team. I thought we played some really great defense and made some really great saves."

Wentzel's hat trick marked the second of her career as she had a hand in four of Lehigh's eight first-half goals. With LaBeau's four points, she reached a career-high 50 points on the season, already eclipsing last season's total of 48. She also became Lehigh's first player to reach 50 points since the 2011 season. Junior Lauren Beausoleil scored a goal while adding two groundballs, a draw control and caused turnover.

"I thought the defense was tough, all the way from our attackers back," said Redfern. "We talk about playing 100 yards of defense with all of our players as soon as we don't have possession of the ball. Our attackers got that started for us tonight and our close defense did a really nice job, getting some great double teams. Julianne (D'Orazio) got some really nice checks back there and Taylor (Tvedt) came up big."

The Lehigh defense impressed once again, allowing five goals or fewer for the seventh time this season. Junior Julianne D'Orazio helped spearhead the defense with two caused turnovers, while also tying a career-high two goals. Junior Taylor Tvedt finished with eight saves, six coming in the second half.

Wentzel and LaBeau scored early goals to give Lehigh a 2-0 lead with 24:09 remaining in the first half. Rutgers pulled within 2-1 at the 23:24 mark, but the Mountain Hawks answered with the next two goals and seven of the next eight. Wentzel scored off an assist from LaBeau to give Lehigh a 4-1 lead then 2:28 later, LaBeau scored from Wentzel to give the Mountain Hawks a 5-2 advantage. Free-position goals from Wentzel, senior Kendall Garden and D'Orazio gave Lehigh an 8-2 lead at the half.

D'Orazio added her second goal at 23:48 of the second half then Rutgers' Kristina Dunphey scored the next three goals to pull within 9-5 with 17:01 remaining. Neither team scored the rest of the way as the goalkeepers combined to make 11 second-half stops.

Lehigh finished with the edge in shots (22-17), groundballs (14-13) and draw controls (9-7).

The Mountain Hawks will resume Patriot League play on Saturday as they host Army West Point at 7 p.m. on Senior Night.

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Team Stats

Haley Wentzel

Julianne D'Orazio

Allison LaBeau

Lauren Beausoleil

Players Mentioned

Lauren Beausoleil

Julianne D'Orazio

Kendall Garden

Allison LaBeau

Taylor Tvedt

Haley Wentzel

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