EVANSTON, Ill. -- Attacker Maggie McCormick (Eldersburg, Md.) and midfielder Tatum Coffey (Toms River, N.J.) netted three goals each, but the No. 7/8 Penn State women's lacrosse team fell to No. 8/6 Johns Hopkins, 13-10, in the first round of the ALC championships at Northwestern's Lakeside Field Thursday afternoon.
Penn State, which fell to 10-7 overall, will learn its NCAA tournament fate Sunday (May 4) when the 26-team field is announced at 9 p.m. The selection show will stream live at NCAA.com.
Both Coffey and McCormick recorded their third hat tricks of the season, while sophomore midfielder Madison Cyr (Westminster, Md.) extended her point-scoring streak to 14 games with an assist on Abby Smucker's (Bel Air, Md.) second-half tally. Juniors Kristin Brent (Rockville Centre, N.Y.) and Kelly Lechner (Silver Spring, Md.) and sophomore Jenna Mosketti (Fallston, Md.) also scored for the Nittany Lions.
After facing a 9-3 halftime deficit, the Nittany Lions out-scored Johns Hopkins (15-3) by a 7-4 margin in the final 30 minutes, twice making it a three-goal game. Freshman goalkeeper Cat Rainone (Newtown Square, Pa.), who allowed seven goals, started for Penn State, while sophomore Emi Smith (Denver, Colo.) turned aside eight shots in relief.
Penn State out-shot the Blue Jays by a 30-27 margin and corralled 18 ground balls to Johns Hopkins' 11. The Nittany Lions, who won 11-of-25 draws, went 1-for-6 on free-position shots and 13-of-16 on clears, while the Blue Jays finished 2-for-3 and 14-of-17, respectively.
In the first half, the teams played a tightly-fought opening 15 minutes with the score knotted at two goals apiece. After Johns Hopkins surged to a 2-0 lead, Coffey and McCormick netted markers four minutes apart at 8:28 and 12:28, respectively, to make it a 2-2 game. After McCormick's strike, Johns Hopkins responded with five goals in a 7:45 span en route to a 7-2 lead.
An Eldersburg, Md., native, McCormick brought the Nittany Lions to within four with 5:21 remaining when she took Lechner's feed to the left of the net and fired a bounce shot past Blue Jay goalkeeper Caroline Federico. The Blue Jays then ended the half with two strikes, including their final tally with 11 seconds remaining, as they grabbed a six-goal advantage.
The Nittany Lions opened the second stanza on a 4-1 run to make it a 10-7 game. Mosketti netted her 29th of the season with 21:57 left in the game after she took advantage of Federico's misplay and slipped the ball into an unoccupied net. After a Hopkins goal with 15:39 remaining, Penn State netted three quick strikes in a 3:11 span.
With 15:20 left, Coffey recorded her second of the game after cutting hard to the net and scoring. McCormick completed the hat trick 2:57 later when she drove around the net and fired a shot low. Just 14 seconds later, Cyr found Smucker cutting toward the cage.
After Smucker's tally, the team's exchanged three-goal runs to end the game. After the Blue Jays extended their lead to 13-7, Coffey brought her season goal total to 23 with 4:34 left in the game. Brent added a free-position marker with 3:13 remaining before Lechner scored with 19 seconds left on the clock to account for the 13-10 final.