Athenas Bow Out of NCAA Tourney to Tigers in Second Round

COLORADO SPRINGS, Calif. - For the second-straight season, the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps women's lacrosse team bowed out of the NCAA Tournament in the Second Round with a loss against the Colorado College Tigers. The Athenas fell by a 17-13 final score on Sunday afternoon in Colorado Springs. CMS went down early, but battled back and made it a one-goal game at the half, but the Tigers pulled away in the second-half to earn the victory and advance to the Third Round of the Tournament.

Corie Hack (CMC) led the Athenas with six goals in the game on 12 shots. Lauren Clubb (CMC) added three goals in her final game in an Athenas' uniform.

The Tigers jumped out to an early 3-0 lead, after dominating the first 10 minutes of Sunday's game. Colorado College held a  12-4 advantage in shots just over 10 minutes into the contest and more importantly a 3-0 lead on the scoreboard.

Corie Hack scored the first two goals of her day with back-to-back tallies just over a minute apart to pull CMS within one score of the Tigers. After Colorado College and CMS traded goals, the Tigers rattled off three-straight tallies to take a 7-3 lead with 5:51 remaining in the first-half.

Despite trailing by four goals in the opening half, CMS rallied back with four-straight goals to tie the match at 7-7. During the four-minute span, CMS actually scored on their only four attempted shots with Hack, Hannah Graves (CMC), Clubb, and Evan Murphy (CMC) connecting on goals during the stretch.

Steph Kelly struck with just seconds left on the clock in the first-half to give the Tigers an 8-7 lead heading into the second-half.

The Tigers took the momentum from Kelly's late first-half goal into the second-half and scored five of the first six goals in the period to take a 13-8 advantage. Corie Hack connected for the lone CMS goal in the first 17 minutes of the stanza.

The Athenas' offense picked it up late in the half with five goals in the final 13 minutes of the period, but the five-goal differential was too much to make up and the Athenas eventually fell by a 17-13 final. Corie Hack and Julia Mueller (SC) each scored twice down the stretch and Clubb found the back of the cage once, but it was not enough as the Athenas' season ended in the Second Round of the NCAA Tournament for the second-straight season.

Some stats of note from Sunday's game, goalkeeper Anna Gillespie (SC) made a career-high 14 saves in the loss, Colorado College outshot CMS 45-35, the Athenas were called for 18 more fouls than the Tigers (42-24), and it marked just the third time this season that CMS allowed 10 or more goals in a game.

The Athenas finish the 2018 season with a stellar record of 18-2. CMS dropped the first and last games of the season, with 18-straight victories sandwiched in between.