PRINCETON, N.J. – The #12/9 women's lacrosse team's 2017 season came to an end on Sunday afternoon in the second round of the NCAA Tournament, as the Big Red fell to the #5/5 Princeton Tigers, 11-9, at Sherrerd Field. Cornell finishes the season with an overall record of 13-6 while Princeton (15-3), advances to face Penn State in the quarterfinals. 

Senior Amie Dickson (2g, 1a) and junior Ida Farinholt (3g, 0a) each finished with three points while senior Catherine Ellis (1g, 1a) and junior Taylor Reed (2g, 0a) contributed two points each. Reed moved into second all-time in program history with 12 career NCAA Tournament points while Farinholt's six draw controls was a single game tournament record. Senior Renee Poullott – who came up big for Cornell just seconds after the opening draw – finished with eight saves and ends her career with 453, the second most in program history while Dickson, Ellis, and senior Catie Smith finish their careers in the top 10 of several statistical categories.

"I'm enormously proud of the Class of 2017," said head coach Jenny Graap. "They leave an incredible legacy with Cornell lacrosse with their effort, competitive spirit and passion."

Princeton's Anna Doherty controlled the opening draw and charged in unmarked but Poullott sticked away the shot, sparking Cornell the other way and to an early 2-0 lead. The Big Red cleared the ball and capitalized on its first possession when Farinholt worked her way towards the crease and turned to fire a shot past Ellie DeGarmo. Sixty seconds later, Ellis came from behind the net, turned her defender and fired high to make it 2-0 with less than three minutes gone.

However, five unanswered goals from the Tigers erased Cornell's early lead with five minutes to play in the half.

Two point blank saves from Poullott – including one on a free-position – kept the Big Red in the play and after over 20 minutes without a goal, Reed ended the scoring drought. The junior sliced down the right side of the arc, ducked and then put the ball past DeGarmo for a two goal game.

With two minutes to play in the opening stanza, Poullott again came up big for Cornell, making a save on a shot from a hard charging Tiger right at the top of the crease. The senior finished with five first half saves.

Princeton grabbed the first goal of the second half but Dickson's free-position goal with 22:11 to play kept Cornell within reach.

Farinholt earned two minutes of up play with a hard charging effort inside the eight-meter arc and the teams traded goals during the yellow card. Princeton got a down goal but Dickson scored her second goal of the game with one second left on the advantage.

With 18:41 to play, it was Dickson that laced a pass from the top of the 12-meter fan to sophomore Sarah Phillips for a doorstep finish to pull Cornell within a goal only to have the Tigers score two straight to go back up by three.

Down but not out, Cornell responded with three straight goals to tie it up at nine.

As the clocked ticked towards the midway point of the second half, Farinholt cut through the eight-meter and batted home a feed from Ellis to make it 9-7. Reed's second of the game with 5:30 to play – another spectacular, solo effort to turn a fire at the top of the crease – made it a one goal game.

Right after Farinholt's goal, storm clouds rolled in the sky opened up and rain started to pour down on Sherrerd Field.

Princeton capitalized on the harry situation with two goals in two minutes and then the referees signaled a lightening delay right after the Princeton score that made it 11-9.

The teams resumed played 30 minutes later, with 2:07 on the game clock.

"We wanted to get a good offensive look going [coming out of the break]," said Graap. "We were thinking that we had plenty of time to mount that comeback and we had some players that were really hot today with their shots."

Cornell had control of the draw following the break but the Tigers picked off a pass on the possession and killed off over a minute of clock before Cornell was able to regain the ball with 30 seconds remaining.

Dickson earned a free-position attempt with 22 seconds remaining but DeGarmo made a save on that shot and then again on Ellis' last second attempt to finish with 15 saves in consecutive games against the Big Red.

Smith finished with one caused turnover for a new single-season program record of 42.

Cornell held the final edge in shots (30-27) and draw controls (12-11) while Princeton had the edge in ground balls (17-12).

"I'm excited that we had a good number of juniors, sophomores and a couple freshman in there in the mix there year, learning and having that chance to spend a good amount of time with the seniors and learn from them," said Graap. "I think the program is in great shape to just continue on strongly."