Despite a 45-minute delay to the game due to weather on Thursday evening, the Notre Dame women’s lacrosse team came out strong and never looked back as it closed out the regular season with a decisive victory over Louisville.
This game marked the end of the road for the Louisville Cardinals, who had already been eliminated from ACC Tournament contention. But for the Irish, the final regular season contest would be critical in giving them momentum to take into the postseason, especially after the 4OT loss at Syracuse on Saturday.
From the opening draw, the Irish dominated. Senior attacker Emma Murphy had three points in the first 2 minutes, 8 seconds of play, scoring two goals herself and assisting one for freshman midfielder Maura Irish.
Notre Dame’s strong, aggressive defense — one of the best in the nation — soon proved that it was coming out just as strong as the Irish offense. Louisville’s first three offensive possessions resulted in three turnovers. In that span, freshman attacker Charley Bacigalupo also added her first goal of the game.
The impact of freshmen like Bacigalupo, Irish and attacker Grace Maroney can hardly be overstated. Maroney quickly joined the scoring party with an impressive drive from behind the cage. Maroney, Bacigalupo and Irish tallying goals in the first five minutes of the matchup against Louisville are not at all out of the ordinary but still remarkably promising for the future. For Maroney especially, this game was about to become the best of her career.
Another freshman who certainly deserves mention for her early impact on this game is goalkeeper Ceci Patterson. Patterson smothered two shots from practically inches outside the crease, which only fed the already high energy for the Irish.
After those saves, a fast break goal by Maroney, her second of the day, was the last straw that forced a Louisville timeout.
Though it struggled slightly at the draw circle, uncommon for Notre Dame as freshman Uma Kowalski typically dominates, the stifling Notre Dame zone defense prevented any open looks for Louisville.
In a play that highlighted the freshman class even more, Patterson saved a free-position shot and cleared it to Irish, who found a wide-open Bacigalupo to finish the goal. Murphy was next to score, completing her first-quarter hat trick.
The first quarter ended with the score 8-0 Irish. Sisters Lila O’Brien, a sophomore midfielder, and Franny O’Brien, a senior midfielder, led the way on defense with three and two caused turnovers, respectively. The balanced attack was incredibly promising for the Irish, especially considering superstar sophomore attacker Madison Rassas had yet to be really involved.
The second quarter was more of the same for Notre Dame. Murphy yet again took less than a minute to score an unassisted goal, and though Louisville secured the draw, the defense prevented the Cardinals from even penetrating the 8-meter arc. When Notre Dame committed its own first turnover of the day, Maura Irish immediately intercepted a pass to prevent the Louisville clear. In other words, it appeared, through the first 20 minutes of play, that Louisville simply could not keep up.
The Cardinals did first get on the board on a woman-up opportunity. But on their next offensive opportunity, a Louisville shot hit the pipe and wound up in the stick of senior defender Abigail Lyons, a play that just about summarized how Louisville could not catch a break in the game so far.
A few Irish possessions came up empty as Cardinals goalkeeper Haley Richards found her rhythm a bit, but the Irish defense decisively held their ground.
Notre Dame went woman-up for the first time of the afternoon after a dangerous shot penalty, and Rassas quickly added her name to the scoring sheet in dramatic fashion with a perfectly placed behind-the-back goal.
As the clock wound down, Maroney achieved a hat trick of her own from a difficult low angle to extend the lead to 11-1 and send the game to halftime. Overall, the aggression of the Irish compared with that of the Cardinals was a key factor in the first half. Notre Dame was tripling Louisville’s caused turnovers at 9-3 and more than doubling their ground balls at 14-6. Any Louisville player who attempted to clear was triple teamed, while the speed of graduate defender Julia Carr and sophomore midfielder Shannon Earley in transition rendered the Irish practically untouchable on their clear attempts.
In the opening of the second half, the defense remained stifling. Carr helped force a low-angle shot that Patterson easily denied. In addition to the staggering caused-turnover statline, the defense was dominant.
With 11:06 remaining in the third quarter, Bacigalupo became the third Notre Dame player with a hat trick in the game. Two minutes later, Maroney bounced in her own fourth goal, making the score 13-1. The back-to-back freshman goals continued to demonstrate the incredible scoring talent of Notre Dame’s youngest stars.
If one had to find a criticism for the Irish in this game, it would be their woman-down performance. After a penalty sent the Louisville offense to a 7-on-6 opportunity, the Cardinals capitalized by scoring their second goal of the day.
Rassas made up the deficit quickly, though, netting her second goal of the day. Though the Irish offense had certainly slowed down after its red hot start, it maintained control of the game with long, controlled possessions, so even possessions that did not end in goals remained effective. With just four seconds remaining in the third quarter, Maroney scored once again, this one assisted by junior midfielder Angie Conley.
Notre Dame still had some difficulty at the draw circle, but its play everywhere else on the field was so dominant as to make that aspect easy to overlook. However, the draw will be an area that will certainly impact Notre Dame’s success as it moves into ACC Tournament play.
By the fourth quarter, even the defense joined in on the scoring, as Lyons picked up a ground ball and took it coast to coast to expand the Irish lead to 14. After that, Notre Dame went on a run to rival its first-quarter momentum. The O’Brien sisters executed a textbook double team, and Grace Maroney notched her sixth goal of the day on the other end of the field. Moments later, junior midfielder Meghan O’Hare scored her first goal of the day, becoming the seventh Notre Dame player to score.
As the clock wound down, the level of play descended slightly, and Louisville was able to score a third goal, its first at even strength. But overall, it was all Irish at Arlotta Stadium in this final regular season fixture. The final score was 18-3.
Takeaways from the game should be tremendous confidence in the Notre Dame defense, which held Louisville to its fewest goals all year, as well as an encouraging display of the depth of the Notre Dame attack in the absence of newly named Tewaaraton Award nominee Kate Timarky. Notre Dame now heads to Charlotte to face Clemson in the ACC Tournament on Wednesday.
