WILLIAMSBURG, Pa. – The Manhattanville women's lacrosse team battled back from an early seven-goal deficit to tie the score, but Lycoming College scored eight of the game's final 10 goals to escape with a 16-10 victory in Middle Atlantic Conference action on Saturday afternoon at the Shangraw Complex.

Junior Justine Titko led all scorers with five goals for Lycoming, while senior tri-captain Abbe Grimes (Hamden, Conn.) once again led the Manhattanville charge with a team-best four tallies.

The Warriors blitzed the Valiant squad early on in the teams' second conference contest of the season, scoring the first seven goals of the game to jump out to a 7-0 lead after 18:03 of play. Titko and senior Crystal Cody were the main factors in the early run, scoring 19 seconds apart to put the home team up by three and then combining for three goals in 35 seconds to give the Warriors a seven-goal lead with 11:57 left in the first half.

To the Valiants' credit, the visitors did not fold under the early pressure, as Manhattanville scored the final four goals of the first half to head into halftime down by just three. Grimes got the visitors on the board with 6:57 remaining in the period, and the Valiants scored twice in 36 seconds later in the period on another Grimes score and a free-position goal by sophomore Kristy Guichard (Melville, N.Y.) to help bring the deficit down.

Manhattanville came out of the break and scored four of the half's first five goals to amazingly knot the score at eight with 19:26 left in the match. Grimes had two unassisted goals during the run, while sophomore Cassie Kovac (Saugerties, N.Y.) and senior tri-captain Katie Bertel (Colorado Springs, Colo.) found the net one time each.

With her fourth goal of the afternoon, Grimes moved past former teammate Cory Alcorn '08 for third place on the school's career goals list. The senior has 176 goals in three-plus seasons with Manhattanville, and sits 13 tallies behind the 189 goals of Liz McNamee '03 for second place all-time.

Unfortunately for the Valiants, Titko then took the game over offensively for Lycoming, scoring her team's next three goals to give the Warriors some breathing room. Junior Bri Robertson added a pair of scores to complete a 5-0 run for the home team, and Manhattanville could get no closer than four goals the rest of the way.

Sophomore Kirstin Betsill (Parkton, Md.) made 10 saves in goal for Manhattanville, while counterpart Brittany Ryan stopped seven shots on the other end for Lycoming.

Manhattanville (4-1, 1-1 MAC) will look to get back on the winning track Wednesday at 4:00 p.m., when the team returns to GoValiants.com Field to take on Widener University in a conference contest. Lycoming (3-4, 1-1 MAC) travels to Misericordia University on Wednesday for a 4:00 p.m. matchup.

2009-03-21