Before the opening draw in the Terrapin women’s lacrosse game against Massachusetts on Saturday, everything that could go wrong in the pregame ceremonies at Ludwig Field did go wrong.
The national anthem cut off halfway through. The public address announcer garbled the starting lineups. Sky-high temperatures continued to soar.
With all that had gone right the previous weekend, the Terps hoped the early blunders weren’t a sign their luck had changed.
They weren’t. The No. 1 Terps (17-1, 4-1 ACC) easily cruised past Massachusetts 14-4 in the first of two nonconference games to close out the regular season.
“We came off a huge weekend, a huge win, so we told ourselves, ‘Let’s play even better,'” midfielder Alex Aust said. “When we played UNC, we played great, but it wasn’t our best.”
The Terps, much like they did in the second half of their 10-5 ACC championship game win against then-No. 1 North Carolina, slowed down the game’s tempo to start. The Terps scored only two goals in the first 14 minutes, one each from midfielders Brandi and Brittany Jones.
But after midfielder Laura Merrifield scored on a free position shot in front of the goal with 15:05 remaining in the first half, the Terps’ offense exploded. Not even a Minutewomen (10-9) timeout could stop what was going to happen next.
Only 24 seconds after Merrifield’s goal, attacker Karri Ellen Johnson won the draw and stormed down the field to score a goal herself. Another 22 seconds later, attacker Sarah Mollison worked at the top of the 12-meter fan, made a spin move and whipped the ball past Massachusetts goalie Katie Florence.
Even without the ball, the Terps were dangerous. After the Minutewomen won the next draw, they opted to work the ball around their defense, hoping to keep the ball from Terp sticks. Eventually, Florence decided to pass the ball up to midfield, where Caitlyn McFadden lurked in the background.
The midfielder read the pass, jumped up and intercepted it to start a wide-open fast break. With no one around her, the senior sprinted up to the crease and scored effortlessly against the rattled Florence.
“It was just [about] getting into it and getting our rhythm going,” coach Cathy Reese said of the team’s slow start.
After attacker Kate Fass scored a minute later, the Terps had pushed their lead from two to seven in less than three minutes. Before long, the team’s starters earned themselves a break on the bench.
When the game finished, nine different players had scored for the Terps.
“We got to play a lot of people today,” McFadden said. “We wanted to be unselfish and find the open looks, which I think we did.”
Aust may have been the greatest beneficiary of the early success. The freshman scored two second-half goals, killing any hopes of a Massachusetts comeback as she extended the Terps’ lead to 12 midway through the final period.
“It’s got to be scary for other teams, because we’re all so dangerous with the ball,” Aust said. “We’re a really selfless team, so we’re not looking for just one person to score. “
The Minutewomen scored only one goal in the first half before adding three more in the second. The Atlantic 10 champions even struggled against the Terps’ backup defending trio of Melissa Diepold, Sara Cooper and Elizabeth Hamilton, only notching their last two goals in the final 10:52 of the game.
Terps defender Karissa Taylor, meanwhile, held midfielder Jackie Lyons — who leads the Minutewomen in goals and garnered WomensLax.com Player of the Week honors last week — without a point on just two shots.
“I’m glad we stepped out after the ACC Tournament and showed we’re still a dominating force,” defender Brittany Poist said. “We didn’t show as much poise as we normally do, but clearly, we got the job done.”
ceckard@umdbk.com
