Cornell Punches Ticket to Ivy League Tournament
from press release
ITHACA, N.Y. – On a cold and rainy Senior
Day, it was a sophomore that put the Cornell women’s lacrosse
team into next weekend’s Ivy League tournament, as Jessi
Steinberg tallied six goals to lead the Big Red to a 12-5 victory
over Yale on Sunday afternoon on Schoellkopf Field. With the
victory, Cornell improves to 5-8 overall and 4-3 in the Ivy League
and earns the No. 3 seed in the conference tournament. The Big Red
will face No. 2 seed Dartmouth on Friday, April 30 at 4 p.m.
on Franklin Field.
In addition to Steinberg’s productive day, the Big Red got
three goals and one assist from Katie Kirk, as well as two goals
and one assist from Libby Johnson. Tissy O’Connor also
registered one assist for Cornell. Caroline Helmer was again
outstanding with four ground ball wins, two draws and a caused
turnover. In between the pipes, senior Kristen Reese made the start
and earned the win, before giving way to Kyla Dambach, who finished
the day with six saves and just three goals allowed.
Yale (6-9, 3-4 Ivy) was led by Jessica Sturgill’s three
goals, while Devon Rhodes and Kaitlyn Flatley each tallied once.
All five Bulldog scores were unassisted. Whitney Quackenbush
finished the day with six saves in the loss.
Cornell held the edge in shots (22-16), ground balls (17-9) and
draw controls (10-9). The Big Red also forced 14 Yale
turnovers and allowed the Bulldogs to clear the game safely just
9-of-15 times. Cornell turned the ball over 10 times and cleared
the ball successfully 12-of-13 times.
Steinberg scored the first three goals for the Big Red, putting
the home team up, 3-1, at the 20:32 mark. The first two goals were
assisted by O’Connor and Johnson, respectively, while the
third tally was unassisted.
Yale cut the Cornell advantage to just one goal when Sturgill
scored an unassisted goal exactly one-minute later, but Kirk
restored the two-goal advantage to the Big Red with just under 13
minutes to play in the first half.
Back-to-back goals by Steinberg and Johnson gave Cornell its
biggest lead of the half, 6-2, before Sturgill scored her second of
the day on a free position goal and the Big Red headed into the
locker room with the 6-3 lead.
Both teams battled back and forth in the early moments of the
second half until Rhodes ended the scoring drought when she beat
her defender and ripped a low shot past Dambach to make it a 6-4
game with 21:10 to play.
Steinberg returned the three-goal lead to Cornell when she picked
up a loose ball in front of the goal and buried it just under the
crossbar to give the Big Red the 7-4 lead.
A free position goal by Sturgill made it a 7-5 game with just over
12 minutes to play, but Kirk answered moments later with a free
position goal of her own as she beat Quakenbush high on her
non-stick side to go up, 8-5.
Johnson added an insurance tally with just over five minutes to
play when she beat her defender and streaked unabated to the goal
to score from point-blank range. Just over one minute later,
Steinberg scored in nearly the identical fashion as she ran
untouched down the middle of the field and beat Quakenbush down
low.
With just over one minute to play, Kirk scored on a breakaway
before senior Morgan Hale registered her first career goal with
five seconds remaining on the clock to account for the 12-5 final.
