When the Northwestern lacrosse team hosted then-No. 10 Notre Dame last season, the Wildcats’ offense was held to just three goals — less than half of its season average.
Saturday, the Cats had a chance for payback.
NU traveled to South Bend, Ind., looking to avenge the 11-3 loss from a year ago. Although NU tripled its offensive output this time around, the Fighting Irish racked up nine goals in the second half of a 13-9 win.
Three of the Cats’ goals came in the final 34 seconds as they fell to the Irish again.
After No. 18 Notre Dame (6-7) jumped out to an early 3-0 lead, the Cats struck back with goals from sophomores Erin Flynn and Donna McCann. The teams traded scores just before halftime, leaving NU trailing 4-3 going into the break.
NU (7-7) has struggled to maintain its intensity level in recent losses, and Saturday’s second-half breakdown again showed the team’s inability to stay focused for a full 60 minutes.
“In warm-ups and in the first half, we were very focused and very intense,” sophomore Abby Alley said. “But then about 10 or 15 minutes into the second half, people were dropping balls and stuff like that. Our composure was terrible, we just couldn’t come back from that.”
Alley was one of few bright spots in the Cats’ defensive collapse after the break. After Alley shut down Penn State’s top scorer, Colleen O’Hara, last weekend, NU head coach Kelly Amonte Hiller rewarded her with the task of marking Notre Dame pre-season All-American Danielle Shearer. Coming into Saturday’s contest, Shearer led the Irish in scoring with 32 goals and 22 assists.
But as Notre Dame tried to get the ball to Shearer on fast breaks and transitions, it found that Alley was there almost every time. For the second straight week, she held a marquee player scoreless.
“Abby did a good job denying her the ball,” junior defender Ashley Koester said. “She really got in her head. (Shearer) wasn’t effective at all.”
But prolonged scoring droughts in the second half doomed the Cats. The Irish scored early and often — three goals in the first six minutes of the half gave Notre Dame a 7-3 lead.
With 23:13 left in the game, attacker Erin Flynn converted on a feed from freshman Lindsay Munday for her second goal of the day. But NU didn’t score again for almost 10 minutes. After two Notre Dame scores, Munday broke the Cats’ scoring drought with an unassisted goal.
With the score 9-5, Notre Dame put the game out of reach by scoring four more times in the next 12 minutes. The Cats answered with one goal.
Then Angela McMahon entered the game. The junior netted her first hat trick of the season with three goals in the game’s final 34 seconds.
In the Penn State game, NU outscored the Lady Lions 7-3 in the second half after being shut out 9-0 in the first. And once again, the Cats came up with too little, too late.
“Basically we can’t let teams get away from us like that,” sophomore Kate Darmody said. “It’s like we wake up when we’re five goals down and decide we need to play.”
With only two games left, any chance for NU to make the postseason is out of reach. But the Cats can take some solace in finishing above .500 if they beat Colgate and No. 11 Syracuse this week.
“We can play at the top level,” Darmody said. “We just need to win at that level.”
