ITHACA, N.Y. – The No. 18 Big Red women's lacrosse team is back to the friendly confines of Schoellkopf Field on Friday for its most important game of the season against Ivy League rival Brown. Both teams have their eyes on the Ivy League Tournament, and both teams' postseason fate likely rides on this contest. The teams will begin play at 4 p.m.
GAME INFORMATION
GAME #11: No. 18 Cornell vs. Brown
GAME TIME: Friday, April 12, 4 p.m.
GAME SITE: Schoellkopf Field (Ithaca, N.Y.)
SERIES RECORD: Cornell leads 19-14
LAST MEETING: Cornell won 16-8 on April 28, 2012
2013 RECORDS: Cornell (6-4, 2-3 Ivy League); Brown (9-2, 2-2 Ivy League)
LIVE STATS:
Cornell Live Stats
LIVE VIDEO:
Cornell Live Video
ABOUT THE BIG RED
Cornell fell for the fourth consecutive game last weekend, dropping a game at Dartmouth by a 9-5 score. Though
Sarah Hefner led the way with three goals, the Big Green defense proved stifling throughout the windy afternoon. Dartmouth goalie Kristen Giovanniello made 10 saves for the win, and Cornell was held to its lowest offensive output since March 2011. Still, Cornell controls its own destiny for a trip to the Ivy League Tournament. If the Big Red wins out, defeating Brown and Yale, it will claim the fourth seed and make the tournament for the second consecutive season.
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 145-96 record at Cornell and earned her 160th career win against Binghamton late last season.
ABOUT BROWN
The Bears, based in Providence, R.I., are having a tremendous season and are currently fourth in the Ivy League standings. With a 9-2 record overall, Brown's two losses have come in league play against Princeton and Dartmouth. The Bears enter Friday's contest on a two-game winning streak, knocking off Harvard last Saturday and Bryant the next day by a combined score of 27-18. Brown is led on offense by Bre Hudgins' 29 goals and nine assist for 38 total points. Abby Bunting is next on the team with 27 points (24 goals, three assists). In net, Kellie Roddy has all 11 decisions for the Bears and a goals against average of just 7.70. Brown is 17th in the nation in draw controls (13.64 per game) and 14th in scoring defense (8.18 goals allowed per game.
THE SERIES WITH BROWN
Cornell leads the all-time series against its Ivy rival from Rhode Island by a close 19-14 margin, but the series has been anything but close lately. Cornell has defeated Brown in 13 consecutive seasons dating back to 2000, as the Bears' last win against the Big Red came in 1999. Cornell won 16-8 last season, closing out its regular season strong by clinching the No. 3 seed in the Ivy League Tournament.
Carly Gniewek made eight saves in that game while
Shannon McHugh,
Katie Kirk and
Caroline Salisbury all had three goals.
A WIN AGAINST BROWN WOULD…
…keep the Big Red in control of its own postseason fate in the Ivy League…be the 14th consecutive win for Cornell against Brown…give Cornell seven wins on the season…be the team's fourth win at home this year.
SPREADING THE OFFENSE AROUND
Sarah Hefner tallied her fifth career hat trick on Saturday against Dartmouth and led Cornell in goals for the game despite entering the day with only 10 goals on the year. The sophomore has now recorded a hat trick in two consecutive games. The Big Red now has five players with at least 10 goals on the season:
Lindsay Toppe,
Caroline Salisbury,
Amanda D'Amico,
Rachel Moody and Hefner. Tripodi and Moody each have double-digit point totals. Last season, 11 Big Red players finished the season with double-digit points.
HELPING HAND
Freshman
Emily Tripodi led Cornell for assists yet again on Saturday, recording three. Tripodi has been off to a terrific start in her young Cornell career, leading the Big Red with 19 assists. She has scored in every game but one, and she notched an impressive five assists in her first career game against Harvard in early March. Tripodi's numbers are also impressing nationally, as her 2.11 assists per game are good for 19th in the nation.
ABOVE AVERAGE
Sophomore goalie
Carly Gniewek has been impressive during the limited time she's seen this season. Gniewek has made 14 saves in 115 minutes of action and allowed just 11 goals, good for a goals against average of 5.72. If she were eligible to be ranked nationally, Gniewek's goals against average would put her second in the country. Her save percentage (.560) would be the best in the nation. She was one save shy of a career high against Penn when she record seven saves. Her career best, eight, came against Brown last season.
BACK IN TOP FORM
Senior defender
Kate Ivory missed all of her junior year with an injury, but the captain looks to be playing her best now that she's healthy. Ivory leads Cornell with 33 ground balls this year as well as 24 caused turnovers. She surpassed her career-high of 23 caused turnovers against Dartmouth, and she's on pace to blow past her career bests ground balls with four more.
ROWE RETURNS
After suffering an injury in the preseason, captain
Chelsea Rowe returned to major action against Princeton in late March. The junior midfielder had a great start to her day, scoring the Big Red's first goal, and she again saw action against Dartmouth on Saturday.
SHOOTOUT CANCER
The Big Red's game against Princeton on March 30 was its annual Shootout Cancer contest. The team sold pink T-shirts to raise funds for the Finger Lakes Cancer Resource Center and passed out flyers in the game programs that contained information about breast cancer.
OVERTIME HIGHS AND LOWS
The Big Red's victory against Penn State on March 13 was its third overtime victory in the last three years and fourth consecutive overtime win in the last five years, but the team's loss in overtime at Penn was its first overtime defeat since February 2007 against Rutgers.
RECORD BROKEN
Sarah Hefner had not only the best draw control day of her career against Albany on March 17, but she also recorded the best draw control day in Big Red history. The sophomore won 10 draws against the Great Danes, breaking the previous school record held by
Jessi Steinberg by two. Hefner had never earned more than four draw controls in a game prior to that contest.
PLAYERS OF THE WEEK
The Big Red has now won an Ivy League Player of the Week award in three of the last six weeks.
Lindsay Toppe was Offensive Player of the Week two weeks in a row before Salisbury and Hefner won on March 18. Toppe – who claimed the honor of March 4 and 11 – was the first Big Red player to earn back-to-back weekly awards since 2002. Back then, Jaimee Reynolds accomplished the feat twice, earning Offensive Player of the Week on April 22 and 29 and Defensive Player of the Week on March 18 and 25.
HATS OFF
Cornell had at least one player record a hat trick in all of its games last year, and its streak has now been extended to 31 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. Against the Big Green,
Sarah Hefner recorded three goals to keep the streak alive for Cornell for the second consecutive week. The hat trick was her fifth of the streak.
Caroline Salisbury has the most hat tricks in that time with 16, while
Jessi Steinberg '12 had 13 before graduating.
SCHOOL RECORDS IN DANGER
Lindsay Toppe and freshman
Emily Tripodi both nearly threatened school records against Harvard on March 2. Toppe's nine points were 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
Besides Toppe already passing her points total from her freshman season – she has 40 points on the year compared to 16 in her first year – other Cornell players seeing a larger role in the offense include
Amanda D'Amico (27 points this year, 18 all of 2012),
Lauren Halpern (eight this year, 11 last year),
Sarah Hefner (16 this year, 10 last year) and
Rachel Moody (22 this year, one in two previous years combined).
NATIONALLY RANKED
Despite losing its last four games, Cornell remains in the top 20 nationally in the IWLCA Coaches' Poll. The Big Red dropped four spots this week, falling from No. 14 to No. 18. The Big Red fell out of the deBeer Media Poll this week from No. 16 last week.
NATIONAL NUMBERS
With 10 games now in the books, the Big Red continues to have players ranked near the top of the country in multiple statistical categories.
Lindsay Toppe is 16th in the nation with her 3.1 goals per game, and her 4.00 points per game has her in 31st.
Kate Ivory is seventh in the country with 2.4 caused turnovers per game and fifth with 3.3 ground balls per game.
Sarah Hefner's 3.00 draw controls per game put her 59th in the country, and
Emily Tripodi is 19th in the nation with 2.11 assists per game.
As a team, Cornell is 25th in the country with its 12.8 goals per game and is 27th in the nation with 13.00 draw controls per game. Cornell is also 15th with 18.5 ground balls per game.
CAREER NUMBERS WATCH
Against Dartmouth:
Approaching career numbers:
UP NEXT
The Big Red has what may be its toughest challenge remaining in the regular season next week when it travels to Syracuse for a 4 p.m. contest on Tuesday.
