Wildcats Defeat Defending State Champion in Girls Lacrosse

The University School girls lacrosse team began its season by defeating Brookfield 19-12 Monday afternoon at USM.

Katherine Engman led the USM attack with six goals and Meredith Jeffers went five for five on her shots for a 100% shooting percentage as the Wildcats took an early lead and kept it throughout the game to defeat the defending state champions.

USM’s head coach Samantha Adey said, “For our first game of the season to take on, and decisively beat, the defending state champions, I think the girls were outstanding.  This was a big win and a great way to kick off the season.  Katherine Engman had a monster game. Defensively she and Taylor Bernard marked Morgan Hollowell, a 2012 All-American and last year’s leading scorer in the state, and kept her to just three goals. However, we were 14 of 33 on winning the draws, that is a stat we need to improve on.  We were also not as strong on the ground balls. We focused much harder on them in the second half and were more successful on those balls (draws and ground balls). The next two days of practice we will focus on fifty/fifty balls so we are ready for our upcoming games. I was proud of Taylor Bernard, Daryl Perry, Alyssa Bilkovski, and Elana Fishbaine, who all played in their first USM lacrosse game today.  They will help us as the season moves on.”

After Brookfield’s Shannon Bayne opened the scoring, the Wildcats scored five of the next six goals to take a solid lead.  Engman scored three of those early USM goals. Jeffers and Elana Fischbaine tallied the other two.

Goals by Hollowell, Bayne, and Julie Evanich closed the scoring gap, but Caroline Harper, Engman, and Jeffers scored to give the Wildcats an 8-5 lead at halftime.

Hollowell and Evanich scored early in the second half to pull Brookfield to within one.  The scoring then went back and forth for the following few minutes, but USM tenaciously held on to the lead.  Leading 11-10 at 15:42 of the second half, Jeffers, Benard, Jeffers again, Alyssa Bilkovski, Addie Lerner, Engman, and Fishbaine scored seven unanswered goals giving USM a solid lead and the decisive victory.

USM is now 1-0.  The Wildcats host Oconomowoc at 5:00 p.m. Thursday.

USM Scoring Leaders:

Name                                   Goals              Assists            Total           

Katherine Engman                  6                      0                   6                       

Meredith Jeffers                     5                      1                   6

Elana Fishbaine                      2                      1                   3

Addie Lerner                          2                      1                   3           

Taylor Benard                        2                      0                   2

Caroline Harper                     1                      1                    2           

Saves

Team

Goalkeeper

Save Total

BRFD

Aliya Manjee

10

USM

Olivia Williamson

10