WILLIAMSTOWN, MA - In another tightly contested conference battle, Williams women's lacrosse fell to Bowdoin this afternoon 9-8. The loss was the Ephs' third consecutive defeat by one goal in the NESCAC.
Bowdoin improved to 5-3 on the season and 4-2 in conference play, and Williams fell to 3-5 on the season and 0-5 in the NESCAC.
Neither team led by more than two throughout the game. Eph netminder Ali Piltch had nine saves, while Bowdoin goalie Tara Connolly had three.
Carolyn Gorajek spearheaded the Polar Bears' offense with four goals and an assist. Williams' offense was balanced, as seven different Ephs scored. Sam Weinstein led the team with two goals.
"As I said to the team, we are so close to being not just a good team, but a great team," Williams head coach Chris Mason said. "Every team in this conference is so good, and we are at the bottom of the conference, and we're still fighting so hard in every game and we are right there. We just need to take that extra step and come through with some wins.
"It's a matter of not having any let downs throughout the game," Mason added. Today, it wasn't necessrily the spell where we let down, but it was the turnovers in the second half that hurt us. The defense did a great job, and Ali [Piltch] did a phenomenal job. They were both fantastic, and handled the ball better coming out of the back today. I felt like it was mostly the turnovers in the offensive end that got us today."
The Ephs and Polar Bears traded blows throughout the first half: Williams took a one-goal lead four times, and each time Bowdoin responded with a goal of its own. Although Bowdoin had the majority of the possession and outshot the Ephs 12-9 on the half, the Eph defense proved focused throughout the first half as they consistently kept the Polar Bears out of the 8-meter arc, and the Williams attack was effective when it gained possession.
The Ephs scored the first goal 2:47 into the game when tri-captain Margie Fulton picked up a pass that hit the ground and spun at the top of the crease before firing the ball low to the left past Connolly, and Gorajek responded for the Polar Bears with a goal on a free position shot 5:30 in. Williams retook the lead when Emily Whicker dodged three Polar Bears moving left to right across the goal and shot low to Connolly's left with 22:13 to play, but Gorajek again retied the game for the visitors when she scored off a spin move at the top left of the crease going to her left with 21:27 remaining in the half.
The Ephs scored again with 18:28 remaining when Rebecca McGovern passed the ball over the top of the Bowdoin defense to Kaitlin Ellis, who took advantage of the 1-on-1 and scored to put the Ephs up 3-2. Bowdoin took possession on the following draw and kept possesion for much of the following 10 minutes, but the Eph defense held them off until Gorajek slipped through the Eph defense and scored with 8:56 to play. The teams then traded goals on free position attempts in the final two minutes of the half, making the score 4-4 headed into the break.
The second thirty minutes proved to be just as tightly contested. Piltch opened the half with three point black saves on the Polar Bears' first possession to keep the game tied, and the Ephs were soon able to take the lead on a man-up opportunity when Weinstein forced turnover on an attempted clear, wrapped around the back of the goal and beat Connolly with 23:09 to play. After Whicker won the following draw, Weinstein gave the Ephs their largest lead of the game, scoring 38 seconds after her previous goal on a free-position shot to make the score 6-4.
Bowdoin then went on their first run of game, scoring on two free-position shots, first with 18:50 to play, then 45 seconds later. The Polar Bears then took their first lead of the game after Piltch made a point blank save, but an offsides call on the clear attempt gave Celeste Swain an open path to goal: She put away 1-on-1 with Piltch to make the score 7-6 with 15:59 to play in the game.
Williams was able to respond to the Bowdoin run less than two minutes later, when McGovern split two Polar Bear defenders coming around the back of the goal and scored with 14:08 to play, knotting the game at seven. Gorajek yet again hit back for the Polar Bears, scoring low to Piltch's right with 12:32 to play. A free position shot from Lilly Wellenbach with 7:36 to play made the score 8-8, but Elizabeth Clegg scored on an assist from gorajek on a man-up opportunity with 5:11 to play to make score 9-8.
Following a 21 minute delay for lightening with 4:43 to play, Bowdoin went into a stall. Although the Ephs broke it once, they lost the ball again with 2:33 to play, and Bowdoin was able to walk away with the victory.
Williams was in particular undone by its second-half turnovers: The Ephs had nine in the second thirty minutes to the Polar Bears' five.
"I feel like many of the turnovers are because we are not showing where we are supporting the person with the ball quickly enough," said Mason. "In the offensive end, it was what we worked on all week, dealing with pressure. It is so important to move the ball to the skip pass option, and in many instances those people weren't showing themselves quickly enough. Some of the turnovers were absentmind passes into the defender's stick. That's just a one-on-one error that you can't make. Mostly it was the support around the perimeter that wasn't there."
Williams next takes on Springfield on 7 p.m. on Thursday night. Bowdoin takes on Southern Maine at 4:30 p.m. on Wednesday.
"Ahead of Springfield, we're going to work on giving support to the ball until we get it."
