University of Richmond
COLUMBIA
No. 14 Richmond Women's Lacrosse Uses Second Half Surge To Overtake Columbia 10-6
03/13/2007 | Women's Lacrosse
March 13, 2007
UNIVERSITY OF RICHMOND, Va. - Led by All-American Mandy Friend with four goals, the No. 14 Richmond women's lacrosse team (5-3) used a second-half surge to take a 10-6 victory in the first-ever meeting with Columbia Tuesday afternoon at First Market Stadium.
The Spiders outscored the Lions 7-2 in the second half, including a second-half hat trick from Mandy Friend, to come back for the win. This was Friend's fifth hat trick of the season.
Preseason All-American Ashley Friend followed with one goal, in addition to assisting on four others, while senior Morghan Vahue added one goal and two assists, sophomore transfer Allison Furstenburg put in a goal and an assist and juniors Erin Kennedy, Samantha Tract and Zara Nematollahi chipped in one apiece.
After falling behind 3-0 in the opening 2:30 minutes of play following a pair of Holly Glynn goals and a free position goal from Rachel Ryan, Richmond called a timeout to regroup and came out to rattle off three unanswered goals.
Vahue assisted on Mandy Friend first tally with 15:02 on the clock before netting an unassisted goal just over five minutes later to close the game to a one-goal differential (3-2).
The Spiders continued their run as Ashley Friend assisted Nematollahi on her first collegiate goal with 3:10 remaining in the first half, knotting the contest 3-3; however, Columbia's Ryan netted her second and final goal of the afternoon with 0:29 on the clock to secure a Lion lead (4-3) heading into the break.
Less than a minute into the second half, Mandy Friend found the back of the net off an assist from Furstenburg to knot the contest (4-4) a second time. Columbia's Kate Lombard responded with a free position goal to give the Lions a 5-4 lead at 25:15; however, that would be the final lead the Lions would enjoy as the Spiders claimed the next six goals.
Vahue assisted Furstenburg on the game-tying goal (5-5) with 23:28 on the clock and Mandy Friend won the ensuing draw and attacked the goal to give the Spiders their first lead of the game just 13 seconds later. Mandy Friend (on her fourth), Kennedy and Tract on goals before notching one of her own with 5:53 remaining as Richmond pulled away with a 10-5 lead.
Lauren Olsen was able to slip in one more Lion goal with just over three minutes remaining, but the Spiders' 7-2 scoring effort in the second half was too much for Columbia and the Spiders were able to escape with a 10-6 victory.
Despite a split 4-4 effort on draws at halftime, Richmond came out with the advantage (11-7), winning seven of the 10 draw controls in their second-half comeback.
Spider keeper and A-10 Co-Player of the Week Jackie Swansburg delivered her fifth double-digit performance in goal, making 13 stops, including nine in the second half, while the Lions' Emma Mintz came up with 11 saves in 60 minutes on the other end.
The Spiders will now enjoy an 11-day break from competition before heading to Towson for a face-off with the Tigers on March 25 at 1:00 p.m.
