The No. 9 Lindenwood women's lacrosse team proved at the UC-Santa Barbara Shootout that it can play with any team in the country. The Lady Lions went 2-1 against Top Ten teams at the event, losing to No. 2 UC-Santa Barbara and winning versus No. 7 Cal Poly and No. 10 UCLA.
On Friday, Lindenwood nearly earned a come-from-behind victory over UC-Santa Barbara, but two late goals gave the Gauchos a 15-14 victory.
Lindenwood fell in an early hole and trailed 13-8 at halftime. The Lady Lions defense became a wall for the first part of the second half as Lindenwood scored six straight goals to lead 14-13 with just over 12 minutes remaining. UC-Santa Barbara showed why its ranked so high by scoring back-to-back goals down the stretch to steal the win.
Lacey Vatland continued her early season scoring spree with five goals. Justiene Groothuis and Kathyrn St. George each had four points, with Groothuis scoring three goals and recording one assist, and St. George having a pair of goals and assists. Laura Boland had two scores, and Ashley Bruce and Jackie Henke had the final tallies.
Christie Mearns saw most of the minutes in goal while Caitlin Erickson earned the start. The pair combined for four saves.
On Saturday, Kristen Papadakos' goal gave the Lady Lions a 7-6 upset win over Cal Poly.
Like the first game, Lindenwood fell behind early, trailing 5-2 at halftime. The Lady Lions fought back and with the game tied at six, Papadakos scored off an assist from Vatland with a little over seven minutes remaining in the game to give Lindenwood the win.
Mearns got the win in goal, making 11 saves. St. George and Groothuis each had two goals and one assists to lead the offense. Other goals came from Vatland and Bruce.
Sunday, a balanced offense and a solid defense led the Lady Lions to an 8-7 victory over UCLA. Lindenwood led 5-3 at halftime and was able to hang on in the second half for the win.
Seven different players scored goals, including Vatland who had a pair. Other scores came from Bruce, St. George, Boland, Groothuis, Papadakos, and Jackie Henke.
Defensively, Mearns had seven saves and St. George had five groundballs.
