...And W. Lax, 17-5, Leaving Both Harvard Teams 3-6

Apparently, 13 is not Harvard's lucky number.

Saturday afternoon marked the 13th time in the career of Princeton Coach Chris Sailer that the Harvard women's lacrosse team met the Tigers. The Crimson had lost in each of those meetings.

And, unfortunately for Harvard fans, history repeated itself. HARVARD  5 PRINCETON  17

The No. 5 Tigers demolished an inexperienced and struggling Crimson (3-6, 1-4 Ivy) in Princeton, N.J. Saturday afternoon, impressing a deep 17-5 stamp on Harvard's forehead.

"Our defense wasn't really all that bad, in spite of the 17-5 score," said junior co-captain Becca Brown. "In the first half, we played pretty good defense, but we did have a few mental lapses that led to Princeton scores."

"The score definitely didn't reflect our effort," said freshman Lizzy Frisbie. "Our defense actually did a good job for us, and [the loss] was very frustrating for our team."

Senior co-captain Claudia Asano led the Crimson with three points. Sophomore Jennifer Lee and Clare Parker each added one point apiece to an inexperienced Crimson attack.

For the Tigers, sophomore Julie Shaner and freshman Charlotte Kenworthy each scored three goals apiece to lead a dynamic and talented Princeton offense. Freshman Kim Smith, senior Cristi Samaras and senior Tice Burke scored two goals apiece for the Tigers.

Three minutes after the game's start, Burke sparked the Tiger attack by scoring an unassisted goal from close range. After Burke assisted on the next goal scored by Shaner, Harvard's Asano stopped the bleeding for the Crimson by scoring an unassisted goal with the clock at 8:40.

With Princeton leading 2-1, the Tigers' Smith and Samaras added two quick goals to extend Princeton's lead to 4-1. Asano then scored another goal for the Crimson, which was Harvard's only free position goal of the day.

Thirty-eight seconds later, the Tigers added another two points to the score behind goals by Shaner and Lucy Small, increasing Princeton's lead to 6-2. With less than eight minutes remaining on the clock in the first half, Parker scored on an assist from Erin Kutner, cutting the Tiger lead in half to 6-3.

Princeton then went on a scoring rampage, netting three consecutive goals to end the period, giving the Tigers an imposing 9-3 lead going into the second half.

Unfortunately for the Crimson, half-time was not enough time to cool off the Tigers. Behind the efforts of Kenworthy, Shaner and Courtney Booth, Princeton scored three goals in the three minutes immediately following the start of the second half.

Asano scored her third goal of the day to cut the Tiger lead to 12-4. In a brief resurgence of the Crimson attack, Lee scored her only goal of the day off an assist by Frisbie, which cut further into the 12-5 Tiger lead.

After the Crimson's two consecutive goals, Princeton's Sailer was forced to call a timeout with 18 minutes to play. Sailer's inspirational words revitalized the Tigers, who went on to score five unanswered goals, resulting in an authoritative 17-5 Princeton victory.

"I think that our whole team worked really hard," said freshman attacker Melissa Christino. "We drove for every ball and played a great game. Things just didn't come together for us as nicely as we had hoped, and Princeton was just a very talented team."

Saturday's loss was the second consecutive decisive loss for the Crimson. Harvard's last match resulted in a disappointing 21-3 loss to No. 1 Maryland in Cambridge last Sunday.

Harvard, which has 10 freshmen on a 26-player roster, has struggled all season to find some sort of chemistry to answer their scoring woes.

"Our team is just very young," Frisbie said. "We don't have a very consistent lineup, and we really haven't been able to click yet as a team. Our offense is basically composed of a lot of freshmen, which makes it hard for us to work together. We just haven't learned yet how to score as a team."

"The midfield has been our struggle, and we've been working hard on it all year," Brown said. "We're going to focus on it until we get it right."

The Crimson's next challenge will come when it travels to Dartmouth on Wednesday afternoon.

"Dartmouth will be a good game because they're pretty strong," Brown said. "It should be a decent match-up for both teams."

Harvard fans must simply hope that history will not repeat itself for the Crimson lacrosse team this week.