About three minutes into the second half of Wednesday’s 17-6 win over No. 13 Virginia, Maryland women’s lacrosse attacker Megan Whittle looked around.
She surveyed both ends of the field and realized that, with the exception of defender Alice Mercer, the players surrounding her will be in the same positions next spring. But coach Cathy Reese didn’t plan it that way.
Midfielder Taylor Cummings was issued her first card at about the six-minute mark in the first half. And with 27:04 remaining in the second half, Cummings received another.
In lacrosse, the second yellow card becomes a red card, meaning Cummings had to sit out the rest of the contest. So after Cummings served her second two-minute stint in the box, she took her place on the sideline. For almost the entire second half, the Terps were without the two-time Tewaaraton Award winner.
“We needed to mentally stay composed,” Whittle said. “[The way we played after the card] speaks volumes to how great our freshmen are and how great our leaders have been integrating everyone on the team.”
During Cummings’ four-year career, midfielder Zoe Stukenberg said the Terps have never gone close to a complete half without Cummings on the field.
“We can barely do 30 seconds without Taylor,” Stukenberg said. “It was a little scary.”
Before Cummings was given the second card, which marked the second straight game Maryland had a player receive two yellow cards, the Terps had a nine-goal lead.
For the first few minutes Cummings was sidelined, the Terps slowed their tempo on offense to regroup. Without their leader in the draw circle and second-leading goal scorer, the Terps momentarily looked lost.
“Taylor’s a constant,” Stukenberg said. “She’s been a constant for four years. To have her on the sideline was tough.”
Virginia went on a 3-0 run in the middle of the second half after scoring just once in the opening 37 minutes. But then the Terps turned it around.
Reese’s squad responded with a 4-0 spurt led by freshman midfielder Jen Giles, who recorded her first career hat trick. Maryland scored six of the contest’s final eight goals.
And they did it without Cummings.
“That’s never happened to her in her career, period, anywhere, ever,” Reese said. “That was a challenge that we had to figure out and come through.”
It wasn’t just the offense that had to adjust in Cummings’ absence, though.
The Terps were forced to turn to Stukenberg in the draw circle, where Cummings has dominated during her career. Her 459 draw controls are more than double what anyone else in program history has secured.
Still, Maryland finished the game with a 16-9 advantage in the circle.
“It was good for us to be challenged in that way,” Stukenberg said. “There was a lot of adversity in this game. It was hard to get into a flow.”
As the Terps finish the regular season with two Big Ten road games — starting with a matchup at Michigan on Saturday afternoon — it’s unlikely Cummings will be out for close to an entire half again.
But Wednesday proved they could win without their star when the time comes.
“We saw players step up and take charge,” Reese said.
