ITHACA, N.Y. – The goals have come at a lightning fast pace through the first two games of the women's lacrosse season, and Cornell hopes to keep that scoring up when Colgate visits Schoellkopf Field on Wednesday afternoon. The Big Red and Raiders will face off at 4 p.m.
GAME INFORMATION
GAME #3: No. 14 Cornell vs. Colgate
GAME TIME: Wednesday, March 6, 2013, 4 p.m.
GAME SITE: Schoellkopf Field (Ithaca, N.Y.)
SERIES RECORD: Cornell leads 26-14-1
LAST MEETING: Cornell won 15-10-6 on March 7, 2012
2012-13 RECORDS: Cornell (2-0); Colgate (2-2)
LIVE STATS:
Cornell Live Stats
LIVE VIDEO:
Redcast
ABOUT THE BIG RED
Cornell, ranked No
. 14 in the country, is coming off another thrilling offensive performance in a 17-12 win against Harvard on Saturday. The Big Red got nine points from
Lindsay Toppe – one shy of tying the school record – and five assists from
Emily Tripodi in her first college game.
Amanda D'Amico,
Lauren Halpern and
Sarah Hefner all scored hat tricks as well as Harvard had no answer for the Cornell attack. The Big Red, undefeated on the year, is expecting to be competitive in the league and nationally this year.
HEAD COACH JENNY GRAAP
Jenny Graap returned to her alma mater in 1997 with one goal in mind: to build the Cornell women's lacrosse team into a championship contender. Now in her 16th year at the helm, the 2002 Intercollegiate Women's Lacrosse Coaches Association Coach of the Year and 2006 Inside Lacrosse Magazine and IWLCA Northeast Coach of the Year has developed the Big Red women's lacrosse program into one of the most successful in the nation. She has posted a 141-92 record at Cornell and earned her 160th career win against Binghamton late last season.
ABOUT COLGATE
The Raiders, based in nearby Hamilton, are 2-2 this season. They defeated Vermont and Marist to start the year but have lost their last two games to Hofstra and Maryland-Baltimore Country. Colgate is led on offense this season by Kate Sheridan, whose three goals and 12 assists have her in the team lead with 15 points. Alison Flood and Amanda O'Sullivan also have double digit points, both with 11. In goal, Jennie Berglin has an 11.50 goals against average and holds a .410 save percentage.
Colgate is coached by Heather Young, now in her seventh year with the Raiders.
THE SERIES WITH COLGATE
Cornell and Colgate have a long history, meeting since the 1970s. In recent years, the Big Red has expanded its lead in the series dramatically, claiming the last 13 contests dating back to 1999. Colgate held a 14-13-1 lead in the series at that point, but Cornell now leads 26-14-1. Last season, the Big Red defeated the Raiders on their home turf by a 15-10 score with
Caroline Salisbury scoring four times and
Courtney Gallagher earning her first career win. Colgate was winless at this point last season, though.
A WIN AGAINST COLGATE WOULD…
…give Cornell a 3-0 start to the season for the second consecutive year…be the team's third consecutive win on home turf…be Cornell's 14th consecutive win against the Raiders…move Cornell to 33-23-2 all-time against current Patriot League teams.
CORNELL AGAINST THE PATRIOT LEAGUE
The Big Red has played four of the seven current Patriot League teams and holds a 32-23-2 record against them. Cornell owes that record largely to a 26-14-1 history against Colgate and an 11-1-1 lifetime showing against Bucknell. Cornell is 4-8 all-time against Lafayette and 1-0 against Lehigh. Cornell has never faces Navy, Holy Cross or American.
PLAYER OF THE WEEK
Lindsay Toppe nearly equaled the Cornell single-game records for points and assists against Harvard on Saturday, and the Ivy League honored Toppe for her excellence by named her the Offensive Player of the Week on Monday. The sophomore set a career high with seven assists in Cornell's season opener against Canisius two weekends ago, but she was even better against the Crimson. Despite not scoring for the first 13 or last 13 minutes of the game, Toppe sandwiched nine points in the contest's middle 34 minutes.
SCHOOL RECORDS IN DANGER
Lindsay Toppe and freshman
Emily Tripodi both nearly threatened school records against Harvard. Toppe's nine points was one shy of Sarah Gur's record 10 points in a game set in 1994. Toppe and Tripodi – playing in her first game for the Big Red – had five assists apiece. The school record of six assists in a game was set four times in program history.
MUCH IMPROVED
Lindsay Toppe has 16 points through two games this season, equaling her output from all of the 2012 season. Other Cornell players seeing a larger role in the offense include
Amanda D'Amico (seven points this year, 18 all of 2012),
Lauren Halpern (five this year, 11 last year), Hefner (five this year, 10 last year) and
Rachel Moody (nine this year, one in two previous years combined).
NATIONALLY RANKED
After spending the first week in the national poll at No. 16 and last week at No. 15 in the IWLCA Coaches' Poll, the Big Red moved up one more spot this week to No. 14.
Cornell continues to receive votes in the deBeer Media Poll.
LUCKY NUMBER SEVEN
Lindsay Toppe and
Rachel Moody each scored seven points in the season opener at Canisius. Both were career highs. Toppe had four goals and three assists, while Moody added two goals and five assists. Seven points was the single-game best for any member of the Big Red roster last year when
Jessi Steinberg had three goals and four assists at Jacksonville. Cornell never had two players record seven points in the same game last season. Toppe and Moody were named to the Ivy League's weekly Honor Roll for their point-scoring outbursts.
TEWAARATON WATCH LIST
Senior
Caroline Salisbury has been named to the Tewaaraton Trophy Watch List, the Tewaaraton Foundation announced before the season. Salisbury was named to the All-Ivy second team in 2012 and was Cornell's second-leading point scorer. A talented player with a powerful shot, Salisbury is one of 51 players across all divisions of college women's lacrosse to make the initial watch list.
SWEET CAROLINE
A breakout star on offense last season, Cornell's
Caroline Salisbury returns as a team captain for her senior year. A walk-on when she first arrived, Salisbury started her career slow but erupted for 44 goals last year to tie for the team lead. She scored a goal in every game last season but the opener at Rutgers, but even in that game she had four assists. She scored a hat trick in nine consecutive games to end the season.
ROAD WARRIORS
Last season brought success on the road, as the Big Red held a perfect 7-0 record in true road games. The only losses away from Ithaca came in neutral-site contests against Notre Dame in Orlando, Fla., over Spring Break and against Dartmouth in the Ivy League Tournament in Philadelphia. So far this year, the trend has continued. The Big Red is 1-0 on the road after defeating Canisius in Buffalo to open the year. Cornell's last true road loss came in April 2011 at Syracuse.
SCORCHING SCORING PACE
The Big Red was stellar on offense all of 2012, posting the second-highest goal total in program history. The team finished with 227 goals, just one shy of the 2002 team's 228. Cornell also was just four points shy of the team record (311, also in 2002) and 14 assists behind the team record (94 in 2000). Through two contests this year, Cornell is ahead of last year's pace by almost two goals.
HATS OFF
Cornell had a player record a hat trick in all of its games last year, and its streak has now been extended to 25 consecutive games with a hat trick. The last time Cornell did not have at least one player with three goals in a game was on March 23, 2011 at North Carolina. Last weekend against Harvard,
Lindsay Toppe,
Amanda D'Amico,
Sarah Hefner and
Lauren Halpern all recorded hat tricks.
2013 CAPTAINS
The Big Red will be represented by three captains this season: senior attacker
Caroline Salisbury, senior defender
Kate Ivory and junior midfielder
Chelsea Rowe.
BACK ON THE FIELD
Four returning Big Red players this season did not see any time last year due to injury but should player larger roles this year. Defender and captain
Kate Ivory, defender
Meg Helmer, defender
Christine Ferguson and attacker
Rachel Moody are all expected to see plenty of playing time in 2013.
FRESH PERSPECTIVE
A large incoming class of 10 freshmen joins the Cornell roster this season. On the attacking side,
Olivia Mattyasovszky,
Jessica Schwab and
Emily Tripodi are new. The freshman midfielders are
Abby Hanson,
Maddie Kiep,
Taylor Kotas,
Brittany Marriott and
Shelby McNeilly. Rounding out the freshman class are defenders
Greer McBeth and
Catherine Moubayed.
NATIONAL NUMBERS
Through two games, the Big Red has players ranked near the top of the country in multiple statistical categories.
Lindsay Toppe, with her 8.0 points per game, is all alone in first in the nation. She is also second in assists per game (4.0) and seventh in goals per game (4.0).
Claire MacManus' four ground balls per game puts her eighth in the country, and
Kate Ivory is in 17th in that category (3.5).
Amanda D'Amico's three goals per game has her tied for 32nd in the nation, and Ivory's 2.5 goals turnovers per game puts her 15th.
As a team, Cornell is sixth in the country with its 16.5 goals per game and is fifth in the nation with 16.00 draw controls per game.
CAREER NUMBERS WATCH
Against Harvard:
Approaching career numbers:
UP NEXT
After two games at home, Cornell is back on the road for an Ivy League contest against Columbia. The Big Red and Lions meet on Saturday at 1 p.m.
