BETHLEHEM, Pa. – After being down early, Lehigh battled back and eventually tied Oregon, but the Mountain Hawks fell just short by a score of 11-10 versus the Ducks on Saturday evening at the Ulrich Sports Complex. Freshman Inneke Carmola again led the Brown and White offense with four goals, while Christy Smith and Lissy King both scored twice. Lehigh falls to 4-6 with the loss, while the visiting Ducks improve to 9-5.
“I thought our defense was very solid, Seana (Smith) played very well, and I thought Christy Smith was very good in the midfield,” head coach Liz Ota explained afterwards. “The draw controls (which Oregon won 16-7) were a deciding factor, and I think we could have had a few more opportunities if we could have won more of those.” She continued, “Not having Sara (MacIntyre) forced us to change our style of attack because we run so much of our offense through her, but we really adjusted well.”
Associate head coach Jill Redfern added, “After being down four goals in the first ten minutes, we could have been in trouble, but our girls really showed some fight, battled back and gave ourselves a chance to win.”
Oregon came out of the gate fast, jumping out to a 4-0 lead in the first 4:46 of the game behind two scores from Waldron, and one each from Sarah MacDonald and Brooke Dieringer. Chamberlain got the Mountain Hawks on the board for the first time off of a free position shot with 16:23 to go in the half, and sophomore Kyle Roth brought Lehigh to within two with her third score of the season on a pretty coast-to-coast move that ended in a goal. Dieringer was credited with her second score of the evening at the 9:59 mark, sending the Ducks into halftime ahead by a score of 5-2.
In the second half, both teams came alive on the offensive end, combining for 14 goals. Carmola netted the first score of the second off of a feed from Christy Smith to bring Lehigh to within two, but Dieringer made it a three-goal game with her second score of the evening at the 24:58 mark. From there however, Carmola took over, scoring three straight goals to tie the score at eight with 17:10 left in the game. Dieringer put the Ducks in front just over two minutes later, but Christy Smith again tied it, with her first score of the night with 13:12 to go.
Jen May made the score 8-7 in favor of the visitors with 11:14 left, but King got into the scoring act with her 12th of the season at the 10:17 clip. Waldron put Oregon back in front with 9:25 to go, but Christy Smith took a feed from Roth and brought Lehigh even yet again, this time at 9-9. Lindsay Killian and Sarah MacDonald netted back-to-back scores to give the Ducks some breathing room, but King scored with 25 ticks left to give Lehigh life. After forcing a Ducks turnover, the Mountain Hawks had the ball with a chance to tie, but simply ran out of time.
Oregon out shot Lehigh 33-27 for the game, while the Mountain Hawks had an 18-10 advantage in ground balls. Seana Smith led the Brown and White with four ground balls, and also affected a number of Oregon shots on the defensive end. Freshman Jen Ingalls caused two turnovers and scooped up three ground balls for Lehigh, while classmate Kelsy Ferris sent back 12 shots in goal. Oregon keeper Sam Debow was credited with 10 saves for the Ducks, while Killian led the team with three ground balls.
Lehigh returns to action on Friday, April 6 when the Mountain Hawks host Colgate in a pivotal Patriot League showdown. Both teams enter the game with identical 1-1 records in Patriot League play. The contest is scheduled to begin at 7:00 from the Ulrich Sports Complex. Live video and audio will be available on lehighsports.com.
