Women’s Lacrosse Making Strides on East Coast Swing

The Women’s Lacrosse Program hit the road for their tilt away from sunny Southern California. The Women of Troy are starting to find their groove on both sides of the ball, winners of three out of their last four games.

The Trojans split over the weekend posting an impressive 23-8 victory over LIU Brooklyn, then falling short 18-13 against Princeton. The East Coast Swing was rather comfortable for this current team who has 13 players from either New Jersey or New York.

In the first game of the trip USC came out hot early, getting on the board 28 seconds into the game as Caroline Cordrey started the attack. Freshmen Paige Bonomi did rather well in her homecoming, leading the victorious effort with five goals. The Women of Troy never looked back from that opening goal extending their lead to 6-0 before LIU responded with a strike from Allison Canfield.

Head Coach Lindsey Munday was impressed with her teams performance and said that it was a tremendous building block for the program to win their first-ever road game. Since Lacrosse is such a popular sport on the east coast, do not underestimate the impact of the Trojans victory. The victory continues the process of transforming the reputation of USC Lacrosse and the sport as a whole on the West Coast.

Things did not sail as smoothly in the second game of the trip, faltering to Princeton 18-13 in a hard-fought game. The Women of Troy fell behind 4-0 early as the back-to-back games took a toll on the defense. Once the girls fell behind, the Trojan players amped up the intensity.

Like the mentality of their Head Coach Lindsesy Munday, the team crawled back into the contest by playing hard and fighting for every ground ball. Freshmen Caroline de Lyra capped the strong comeback tying the game at eight as part of a six-goal first half.

The Trojans trailed 10-8 at the half and could never muster enough on the attack to mount the comeback, but certainly earned the respect of their foes. Princeton Sarah Lloyd topped all players with six assists on the day, propelling the offense towards a five-goal victory.

USC stands at 3-3 (1-0) on the season with the bulk of the MPSF schedule approaching, a conference in which the Trojans are currently tied for. This fledgling team with 17 freshmen has plenty of talent with starts like attacker Caroline de Lyra, midfielder Amanda Johansen and goalie Liz Schaefer; all nationally recruited prospects.

The Women of Troy have found balance offensively and are beginning to control possession, something that is huge in Lacrosse. National Rankings are also starting to respect the Trojans work, propelling them to 58th in the Nation. The biggest challenge will be maintaining that sense of focus, with two crucial MPSF games this week.

The Women of Troy travel up north to face MPSF rival 19th-ranked Stanford on Wednesday and then UC Davis on Friday.