Women's Lacrosse Wins, but Falls Short of Tourney

Sitting in a tie for sixth place with one conference game remaining was not where the Harvard women’s lacrosse team envisioned itself heading into the 2010 campaign.

But with Saturday afternoon’s 18-10 trouncing of Columbia (6-8, 0-7 Ivy) at Robert K. Kraft field in its Ivy League finale, the Crimson (7-7, 3-4) gave itself a chance to end up exactly where it originally planned—the playoffs.

Needing a win to keep alive its hope of securing one of the Ancient Eight’s four playoff berths, Harvard relied on a late second-half offensive outburst to put the game away and come up with the eight-goal victory—the squad’s second largest of the season.

Though the Crimson did its part, Princeton’s win over Dartmouth yesterday ended Harvard’s playoff hopes.

“I think we’re obviously happy with the win,” sophomore Melanie Baskind said. “It was a little scary in the first half. We were a little casual on defense, which allowed them to stick around a bit longer. It just took a little bit longer than we were expecting or would have liked.”

Baskind and freshman Jennifer VanderMeulen—who combined for six of Harvard’s 10 second-half scores—led the way, notching five goals apiece.

While the margin may have been large when the final buzzer sounded, it was not that way for the majority of the contest. The Crimson fell behind early to the last-place Lions and needed a late first-half run to take the lead heading into the locker room.

Trailing 4-3 with less than five minutes to play in the opening frame, Harvard went on a 4-1 run to close out the half up by two.

Freshman Danielle Tetreault tied the score at four with 4:24 remaining, going unassisted for the score. VanderMeulen gave her team the lead a minute later with an unassisted goal of her own for her third score of the contest.

But the Lions won the ensuing draw and, just 19 seconds later, tied the score back up at five courtesy of a goal from Olivia Mann.

Baskind—whose five goals were a career-high—gave her team the lead for good with an unassisted score and then found freshman Micaela Cyr with 1:55 left to put the Crimson up by two.

“Mel played a great game,” VanderMeulen said. “She was all over the field. She was playing at full speed on offense and defense. She was able to finish the ball for us, which we were having trouble with.”

But despite its late run, the Crimson was unhappy with its first-half play at the break.

“We weren’t shooting very well,” VanderMeulen said. “We just weren’t playing our hardest. Columbia was able to take advantage of it.”

Harvard attempted to create separation early in the second, but Columbia stuck around for the majority of the game, keeping the deficit at four or less until the final 10 minutes.

After Baskind drew first blood in the second half, the Lions’ Taylor Gattinella responded with a score of her own 40 seconds later.

The teams traded goals over the next six minutes until VanderMeulen and Tetreault notched back-to-back scores in under a minute to put their team ahead by four with 14:04 left to play.

Columbia answered with another score to cut the Crimson’s lead to three but Harvard then rattled off six-straight scores to put the match out of reach.

“[Early in the second half], we started taking control, but Columbia kept inching back,” VanderMeulen said. “We kept getting a lead but didn’t capitalize. In the last 10 minutes we were like, ‘This game can’t be close anymore.’ And then we kind of started going nuts.”

Baskind, Cyr, and co-captain Sara Flood each contributed two goals apiece down the stretch to help the Crimson total its second-highest offensive output of the season.

Following Saturday’s victory, the Crimson needed wins from Penn and Dartmouth—the top two teams in the conference—in order to secure the fourth spot in the Ivy League standings and earn a berth in the inaugural Ivy League Tournament. But the Big Green fell, 11-10, in overtime to Princeton yesterday, leaving Harvard just outside the tournament field.

—Staff writer Martin Kessler can be reached at martin.kessler@college.harvard.edu.