Attacker Megan Whittle looks for a way past the Penn defense during the Terps’ 12-7 victory over Penn on Mar 18, 2015 at College Park.
With the Terrapins women’s lacrosse team clinging to a 3-2 lead late in the first half of its game at No. 4 Northwestern on Thursday night, attacker Megan Whittle broke into a sprint from the right side of the Wildcats’ zone.
As she made her way toward the net, midfielder Kelly McPartland received a pass and quickly sent the ball Whittle’s way.
The freshman grabbed the feed and slashed it into the right corner of the Wildcats’ cage, sparking a 9-0 run to break the back-and-forth nature of the contest.
The momentum-shifting score the second of Whittle’s game-high five goals, which led the No. 1 Terps to a 16-5 victory in Evanston, Illinois, and continued the dominant start of Whittle’s Terps career.
“She played really well, and she opened up opportunities for her teammates,” coach Cathy Reese said. “She’s got such composure out there, such confidence. She is a great shooter, and tonight, she found her looks, she attacked the cage hard and she put away a lot of opportunities that she had.”
Whittle’s five scores Thursday came on nine attempts. Often, she set up by one of the corners of Northwestern’s goal and converted on incoming passes from her teammates.
But when she was on the move, she displayed a knack for drawing opposing fouls, as she has all season. She converted on one of her two free position shots with 58 seconds left in the first half, in the midst of the Terps scoring frenzy she’d started six minutes earlier.
“Just coming down in transition, opportunities were really open for us, and I was the person on the back side, just trying to convert all my shots,” Whittle said. “It was just working for us and I happened to have opportunities there.”
Thursday night wasn’t Whittle’s most productive showing in a Terps uniform. That was her six-goal performance against Towson on March 11, but her efforts against Northwestern proved again why she was Inside Lacrosse’s top-ranked freshman heading into the season.
Whittle bested the combined scoring efforts of Northwestern’s freshman attacker duo of Selena Lasota and Shelby Fredericks. Lasota, Inside Lacrosse’s third-ranked freshman, scored three goals, but the Terps held Fredericks, who ranked fourth, scoreless.
While she’s only 10 games into her college career, Whittle has transitioned into the Terps’ program with ease, Reese said.
“When she has the opportunity [to score], she’s going to take full advantage of it, and then when not, she’s going to move the ball and her teammates will find opportunities,” Reese said. “She’s really fitting in with this offense nicely. She’s a great player with great field sense.”
After facing the Wildcats, Whittle became the Terps’ leading scorer this season with 33 goals, tied for 12th in the nation.
She was also named to the watch list for the Tewaaraton Award, which honors the nation’s best men’s and women’s college lacrosse players, in the first round of additions March 19. She is the only freshman among the three first-round nominees.
And that’s why, as Whittle and her teammates look to extend their undefeated run this season, the Terps will continue to rely on Whittle’s talents and take advantage of her looks on goal each game, just as they did against the Wildcats on Thursday.
“She’s an awesome player all around,” McPartland said. “Nobody can really mark her. Her shot placement is amazing, and I think she’s definitely a threat for us, and I think more teams are going to start to realize that now.”
