BETHLEHEM, Pa. – Behind a career-high eight goals from freshman Lauren Dykstra Lehigh rolled past archrival Lafayette 22-10 on Sunday morning at the Ulrich Sports Complex. With the win, the Mountain Hawks third straight, they improve to 5-1 overall and 1-0 in the Patriot League while the visiting Leopards remain winless at 0-4 overall and 0-1 in the league. The 5-1 start is Lehigh’s best since 2003 and the back-to-back 20-goal performances are the first for the Brown and White in program history. Junior Sara MacIntyre added four goals for the Mountain Hawks, including the 100th of her spectacular career.
Lehigh took 38 shots for the game compared to 21 for Lafayette, while as a team, the Mountain Hawks scooped up 42 ground balls, led by junior MacIntyre’s nine. Both teams were nine-of-13 on clear attempts, while Lehigh forced Lafayette into 17 turnovers and turned the ball over 12 times along the way. Kelsy Ferris finished with seven saves for Lehigh in goal, while sophomore Jen Ingalls scooped up five ground balls and caused four turnovers for the Mountain Hawks “D”.
“I thought the first half was well played,” Lehigh head coach Liz Brode Ota ’95 said afterwards. “LD (Lauren Dykstra) just had a bang-up game. Jen Ingalls played a tremendous game on defense and overall there was a great team effort.”
She continued, “We lost some of our intensity in the second half but overall I thought we played well together and any win over Lafayette is a nice win, particularly when it’s by such a large margin.”
Lafayette’s Andrea Corpora scored the game’s first goal at the 27:26 mark of the opening half, but from there Lehigh ripped off the game’s next six scores, including four from Dykstra and a pair from MacIntyre. After a Lafayette goal at the 15:00 mark to make it a 6-2 game, Allison Thomas netted her eighth goal of the season and senior Christy Smith followed with her ninth score in 2008 to put the home team in front 8-2.
Lehigh would add five more goals in the half, including two from Meagan Tenety, one from Dykstra, one from Thomas and one from Meghan Tranter as the Mountain Hawks built a commanding 13-3 halftime lead.
In the second half Thomas started things off with a score at the 28:30 mark and that paved the way for five straight Mountain Hawk goals. Dykstra, Christy Smith (2), and MacIntyre also added scores as Lehigh went in front 18-3 with 23:55 remaining. Lafayette would score four of the game’s next five goals to get to within 12 at 19-7, but Lehigh always had an answer.
Dykstra netted back-to-back goals at the 9:18 and 5:23 marks to push Lehigh up to 20 goals and MAcIntyre then hit the century mark in goals of her outstanding career with just 12 ticks remaining as Lehigh won its second straight over the archrival Leopards.
Lehigh returns to action on Wednesday when the Mountain Hawks play host to Drexel at the Ulrich Sports Complex. Game time is set for 3:30 and live video will be available on Lehighsports.com.
