St. Joe's Scores Final Six to Beat Richmond
from press release
PHILADELPHIA ---Jen Peters scored a goal off a
Abby Renninger assist with no time remaining to complete an
unbelievable comeback as #3 Saint Joseph's defeated #2 Richmond,
11-10, in the Atlantic 10 Championship semifinals on Friday at
Temple. The Hawks were down 10-5 with 11:24 remaining, but scored
six straight goals to beat the Spiders for the first time in
program history.
Saint Joseph's (10-7) had the ball with just over a minute to play
and the game tied at 10-10, waiting to take the final shot. Peters
held the ball with 15 seconds to go but was blocked in front of the
crease and the Spiders regained possession on a foul by SJU with
seven seconds left.
Richmond (6-11) released the ball out of their defensive end to
Mary Flowers near midfield. Renninger checked her stick, picked up
the ground ball with five seconds to go and ran into the offensive
zone. She tossed it over to Peters who was stationed just outside
of the crease and fired top shelf past UR's Erica Marocco (eight
saves) with zeros on the clock for the stunning victory.
"We won as a team," Peters said. "I was just hoping it went in. It
was a last second shot and I just ripped it."
The historic day seemed to be contained to Jenna Martino, who
scored five goals and tallied an assist, upping her season totals
to 54 goals and 72 points, which are new single-season records. The
rest of the Hawks' offense struggled, just as they had five days
earlier in Virginia against the very same Spiders.
"They earned it," Head coach Denise Roessler said, nearly
speechless, "And I'm not surprised. They fought hard until the end
and it was a team effort."
The comeback began when Jessica Westlake scored off a Julie
Mineweaser helper with 11:24 remaining to cut the score to 10-6.
Meghan McDevitt scored back-to-back goals with 7:25 and 6:52 to go
cutting the four-goal deficit in half, 10-8. The second McDevitt
goal was assisted by Helene Tursi.
Just 11 seconds after McDevitt's pair, Martino went the distance,
taking the ensuing draw control all the way for an unassisted goal.
Fourty-three seconds after that, SJU won another draw control and
Martino was there again for her fifth goal of the game to knot
things up at 10, setting up the final-second heroics by Peters and
Renninger.
"We said when we were down five goals either we have to comeback
now or the season is over," Renninger said. "We said we weren't
letting anymore goals in on defense. It was Christine Readinger who
pumped everyone up and the attack did their job."
In the first half, UR opened the game with two goals during the
11th minute. Martino put two in with 17:32 to go and 9:53 remaining
in the half. UR's Mandy Friend (five goals) notched her first goal
of the day with 7:24 to put the Spiders up one.
Peters scored her first of the day off a Martino helper with 6:13
left to tie the game at three. Friend closed the half with two
goals, including one at the buzzer for a 5-3 advantage.
Friend scored her fourth-in-a-row to open the second half and
double up SJU at the time, 6-3, with 29:39 left. Goals by Martino
and Peters sandwiched another UR tally to make it 7-5 with 24:38 to
go.
The Spiders put three more on the board to make it the 10-5 game
that Saint Joseph's from which SJU would come back.
Defensive Player of the Year Suzy Herlihy had 13 saves on the day,
including two big stops on free-position tries in the last five
minutes.
UR out-shot the Hawks, 32-29, and had the edge in ground balls,
12-10. SJU had 13 draw controls, including four of the last five
during the comeback and nine of 13 in the second. The Hawks were a
perfect 15-for-15 in clears, while Richmond was 10-for-14. Saint
Joseph's moves on to the Championship game for the first time in
program history. The Hawks will take on #1 Massachusetts, 12-9
winners over #4 George Washington, on Sunday at Temple's Geasey
Field at 1:00 p.m.
