RIVERDALE, N.Y. - Senior attacker Julia Lavelle and junior Chrissy Gutenberger each recorded hat tricks but the Manhattan women's lacrosse team fell to Fairfield 16-9 Friday night at Gaelic Park.
Most likely needing to win both home contests this weekend to have any hope of playing in the 2011 Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Championships, the Lady Jaspers (4-9, 1-4 MAAC) fell behind early to the conference-leading Stags (11-4, 5-0 MAAC) and could not sustain enough momentum to cut the deficit in failing to help their cause for postseason play.
Along with Lavelle and Gutenberger, senior midfielder Phelicia VanOverbeke added two goals with freshman midfielder Kelsey Rehain chipping in with one. For Fairfield, attacker Chloe Mangan led all scorers with five goals while teammate Melanie Raso finished with three.
Opening up the contest in a big way, Fairfield stormed out to a 3-0 lead with three goals in the first four minutes of the contest. Addie Reilly, Mangan and Amanda Best each found the back of the net in succession to put Manhattan in an early hole with 25:54 left in the first.
Answering with the next two scores, the Lady Jaspers made it 3-2 after consecutive goals by VanOverbeke and Gutenberger. VanOverbeke made it 3-1 on an unassisted tally with 24:09 remaining in the first period before Gutenberger scored on a pass from Lavelle to cut the disadvantage to 3-2 at the 19:37 mark of the first.
From there, Fairfield would pick up the pace, scoring seven of the next eight goals, including two apiece from Mangan and Raso to push out to a 10-3 advantage with 8:49 remaining before the half. VanOverbeke got one back for Manhattan 24 seconds later to make it 10-4 Fairfield, but the Stags tallied two more times to go up 12-4 at half.
In the second period, both teams would trade goals over the final 30 minutes, with Manhattan outscoring Fairfield 5-4, behind tallies from Rehain, Lavelle and Gutenberger. However, the comeback proved to be too great as the Stags burned time off the clock over the final 15 minutes to cruise to their sixth-straight victory.
In the cage, Katie Keenan made eight saves in recording her 11th victory. Manhattan sophomore goalkeeper Julia DiBernardo recorded eight saves in taking the loss.
Overall, the Stags held advantages in shots (33-24), draw controls (20-7) and clears (15-13) while Manhattan led the way in ground balls (25-23). Each team scored a trio of goals on free-position opportunities.
The Lady Jaspers will return to action Sunday, when they welcome Marist to Riverdale for an 8 p.m. "Senior Night" matchup at Gaelic Park.
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