A season of success for talented Lady Jays
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The women's lacrosse team still considers their 2006 season to have been less than satisfying. Though the girls sported an adequate 12-4 record at the end of the year, they were ineligible to advance to the postseason tournament.
"Last year was just an unfortunate string of events," senior midfielder Meghan Crisafulli said. "We lacked team chemistry, something that is essential in a successful team."
"We did have a strong beginning to the year and did not finish as well as we would have liked. I think it was due, in part, to the improved quality of competition that we faced and our inability to win some of the close games," head coach Janine Tucker said.
But the Lady Jays can't discount the fact that the season was full of highlights, including the team's peaking at No. in the NCAA national polls during the season, and 14-year veteran Coach Tucker reaching her milestone 150th win.
With an earlier-than-usual start to the regular season, the girls -- on enemy turf -- were caught off-guard by -the George Washington Colonials. After a shaky first half to their first match of the season, the Lady Jays found their bearings and took the reins with a 9-point scoring barrage in the second period, led by senior attacker Mary Key.
This game would turn out to be a huge momentum booster that would send the girls on an eight-game win streak.
It also foreshadowed the breaking of the career scoring record by Key, who walked away that February day with the game-high four goals. Key also wound up a 2006 candidate for the Tewaaraton Trophy, the collegiate lacrosse equivalent of football's Heisman Trophy.
With that hard-fought win in their pockets, the Jays were more than ready to play their first home game, against rival Princeton. The girls came out swinging to take a comfortable lead in the first period, but had barely enough defense in the end to hold off the No. 3 ranked Tigers for a close 8-7 victory.
Their first home win was followed up by two dominating performances against visitors from the Buckeye State.
The girls offensively overwhelmed the Ohio University Bobcats and the Ohio State Buckeyes. The Lady Jays found the back of the net 17 times in each game, despite continuing to show signs of second half defensive struggles, giving up easy goals late in the match.
That problem would have to be dealt with in Honolulu, which is where the Jays had a special Spring Break regulation game against the Oregon Ducks.
The first ever NCAA lacrosse game held in Hawaii featured a hat trick, pulled off by senior attacker Alex Nolan, which helped Hopkins to a 15-7 win. This also happened to be the game that put Coach Tucker in the 150-win club.
In an already historic season, the girls kept adding to the list of celebratory events.
In their return to Baltimore, the team tallied another point in their win-column against the American University Eagles, and soared to the 300-win plateau, becoming only the 7th Division I team to accomplish the feat.
Elated, the Lady Jays traveled to Philadelphia and handed UPenn a loss before beginning a two-game home stand.
The girls were triumphant over Vanderbilt, but the offense finally ran out of gas in their next game and couldn't catch up with the Maryland Terps. The Lady Jays' first loss of the season stung extra hard because it was received on Homewood Field.
The team rebounded nicely a few days later with a win against UMBC, and went on to trample the Delaware Blue Hens 17-6 with four different Lady Jays nabbing hat tricks in the game.
From then on, the Jays lost their sense of consistency, losing every other game until the end of the season. The team managed two great wins at home against George Mason and Towson, but fell to Northwestern, Penn State and Georgetown.
"We fought hard all year long and competed like champions, but our losses to Penn State and Georgetown, each by a goal, seemed to take the wind out of our sails. Three of our four losses were by a total of 4 goals and if we can improve in that area, I like our chances this season," Tucker said.
If the team wants to seriously contend this year, Hopkins will have to defeat the established programs, such as Penn State and Maryland. The team is striving to return to the NCAA Tournament and make it to the Final Four.
"We had some slip-ups last year but we've definitely learned from them and have moved on," sophomore attacker Jessica Buicko said. "We have a solid group of returners who have only gotten better since last year and an amazing freshman class."
The girls have thrown down the gauntlet, looking to give at least 16 solid performances this year.
"Expect this year's team to make it farther than we ever have gone before," Crisafulli said.
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