Temple ended its nonconference portion of the season with an 11-7 win against Bucknell University on Sunday at Howarth Field. The Owls extended their winning streak to five games.
In the first meeting between the two teams, the Owls (7-1) took an early lead and staved off a Bucknell run in the second half. The Owls never trailed and only were tied with the Bison for a span of seven minutes and 48 seconds.
Senior attacker Carly Demato scored her only goal of the game to give the Owls an early 1-0 lead with 29:07 left in the first half.
“It’s great to get on the board first,” coach Bonnie Rosen said. “It’s certainly a goal to take the lead and stay up as much as possible, it helps to take off some of the pressure.”
Bucknell tied the score 50 seconds later when sophomore attacker Audrey Walsh scored on an assist from senior attacker Christina Manis. Walsh finished the game with four goals and Manis finished with six assists, leading both teams in each category. Senior midfielder Maddy Molinari scored Bucknell’s other three goals.
After Walsh’s goal, Temple went on a 4-0 run and held Bucknell scoreless for more than 24 minutes.
“Bucknell has a lot of people who can score,” Rosen said. “We were prepared to play a good, solid team defense. We knew they liked to assist a lot of goal their goals, so we were really focused on making sure we limited those opportunities.”
Graduate attacker Brenda McDermott scored the last goal of Temple’s run with 6:16 left in the half to give the Owls a 5-1 lead. McDermott finished with two goals and a team-high four assists. Senior midfielder Morgan Glassford added a goal and two assists.
Bucknell ended its drought with back-to-back goals from Walsh and senior midfielder Maddy Molinari to make it 5-3 with 3:44 left in the half. Molinari scored with 4:04 left before Walsh’s goal 20 seconds later.
Junior attacker Nicole Barretta scored with 35 seconds left in the half on an assist from junior attacker Kira Gensler to give the Owls a 6-3 lead entering halftime.
The two teams traded scores early in the second half. The Bison scored first when Walsh scored her third goal of the game to make it 6-4 with 29:08 left to play. McDermott answered back for the Owls when she scored her second goal of the game on a free-position shot to make the score 7-4. Molinari’s second goal made it 7-5 with 26:12 to play, but the Bison wouldn’t score again for the next 15:07.
Sophomore midfielder Amber Lambeth put the Owls up 8-5 when she scored her second goal on an assist from McDermott with 24 minutes left.
“Having that varied scoring gives us a lot of choices,” Rosen said. “And we hope to extend on that, but however we put more goals in the net than the other team I’ll take it.”
Walsh ended Bucknell’s drought to make it a 9-6 game and force a Temple timeout.
The Bison got within two when Molinari scored Bucknell’s last goal of the day on an assist from Manis with 9:08 to play.
Senior attacker Anna Frederick then scored her second goal of the game and put Temple up 10-7 with 7:51 left to play. Gensler added the final tally with eight seconds left. Freshman goalkeeper Maryn Lowell made five saves to improve to 5-0.
Temple begins Big East Conference play on March 19 on the road against the University of Denver, ranked No. 16 in the March 6 Intercollegiate Women’s Lacrosse Coaches Association poll.
“Denver is a very good team,” Rosen said. “ They’re explosive offensively, they play an aggressive athletic defense and have solid goalkeeping. It’s going to be a really tough test, but we are looking forward to it.”
Tessa Sayers can be reached at teresa.sayers@temple.edu or on Twitter @SayersTessa. Follow The Temple News @TheTempleNews and @TTN_Sports.
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