HARROGATE, Tenn. — The Lincoln Memorial women's lacrosse team (4-1) has won three straight games and is looking to make it four straight on Tuesday when it hosts Walsh University for a 1 pm start. Due to poor field conditions at the LMU Lacrosse Complex, Tuesday's game has been moved to University of Virginia-Wise.
After a season-opening loss at Young Harris, the Lady Railsplitters have found their groove, using a balanced scoring attack and stingy defense to post three consecutive nonconference victories.
Erin DePaul, who has posted 13 goals to start the season, leads the offense.
Amara Moss has found her scoring touch, chipping in with nine goals, followed by
Kelly Csenar with seven and
Casey Kelly with six.
The LMU offense will have to be clicking on all cylinders in order to get the better of Walsh. The Cavaliers have opened their season with three straight victories, the latest a 16-7 win at Tusculum University Saturday. Walsh has scored 49 goals this season and is averaging 16 goals per game.
"They do a really good job offensively," pointed out Head Coach
Caitlyn Corace. "They are able to find openings for their offensive players and move the ball very well. We will have our work cut out for us defensively."
One area of emphasis this week has been on limiting fouls which result in free position shots. Walsh has taken 106 shots in its three games, putting 86 of those shots on goal.
"When they get the ball on offense they are looking to go to the goal pretty quickly," said Corace. "They get a lot of free position shots so we cannot commit a lot of silly fouls because they will capitalize on our mistakes and get a decent shot on goal. We need to play solid defense and hold them in check."
Since the scoring chores for LMU have been spread among four players, teams have a tough time game planning to stop just one scorer.
"Offensively our whole unit is looking at many options," noted Corace. "As we saw at Davis & Elkins Kelly can put the ball in the back of the net and
Melanie Cascio can score. Even when teams are focusing on our top three we have other options that can produce for us. It's just a matter of us finding those other people."
This game will mark the fourth straight game against nonconference opponents. Saturday LMU will open South Atlantic Conference play with a home match against Coker.
"We are definitely anxious to get to conference play, but this is another game where we have to execute to prepare us for Saturday and conference play," said Corace. "It's another test and begins the period in the season when we start playing two games a week. It's about executing in the beginning of the week in our Tuesday or Wednesday games then carrying the focus to the weekend and maintaining consistency."
