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Gauchos On Short End of 8-7 Score with Colorado State

Box Score

May. 6, 2010

Scottsdale, AZ - Colorado State outscored UCSB 4-3 in the first half and held on with a 4-4 second half to win 8-7 in a national quarterfinal game at the WDIA National Championships in Scottsdale. The Rams used a frenetic high pressure defense to force the Gaucho offense out of rhythym and it worked enough to make the difference. The UCSB defense played a great game limiting the CSU offense to 6 goals they earned but the Rams got two freebies in the first half. The first came on a pass that a Colorado State player dropped in front of the goal and after it bounced off a few sticks it slowly dribbled over the goal line and into the UCSB net. The second one came on an own goal from UCSB.

"Both of those together like that certainly could have been deflating but we shook them off well enough to be in a position to get the game back," said UCSB head coach Paul Ramsey. "It came down to being able to score a few more goals and we didn't do that."

Sophomore goalie Jeni Centner (Tustin, CA) had 14 saves playing behind the stifling UCSB defense and finished with 63.6% for saves on shots against her. CSU outshot UCSB 25-13 but Centner kept UCSB in the game with her work in front of the net on the 22 Colorado State shots that were on goal. That included 3 consecutive saves at the end of the game that gave the Gauchos life and chances to tie it each time she stopped the CSU shooters. The Gauchos had 39 ground balls to go along with Centner's 14 saves to have numerous possessions but they still led to only 13 UCSB shots. Colorado State did win the draw control battle getting 11 out of 17.

Senior Maggie Aker (Oakland, CA) led all scorers with 4 goals and 1 assist but only three other UCSB players scored a goal. Sophomore Megan Dawe (Martinez, CA), sophomore Meg Cruse (San Diego, CA) and freshman Katie Mitchell (Lafayette, CA) had 1 goal each.  Senior Sam Lutz (San Diego, CA) had 2 assists.

It was a day of upsets as three of the four top seeds all fell. In addition to the Gauchos losing, 5th seeded Cal Poly SLO beat 4th seeded UC Davis 12-11 in overtime and top seeded Santa Clara lost 12-9 to 8th seeded Colorado, who had squeaked by 9th seeded Georgia in overtime in the first round.

Fourth ranked UCSB is in the unenviable position of playing for 5th place in a 16 team tournament that plays spots out all the way to 15th & 16th place. The Gauchos face 6th ranked Brigham Young at 11:30am on Friday. BYU lost 12-9 to 2nd seeded Lindenwood in another quarterfinal. The winner of the UCSB versus BYU game moves to the 5th place game with the winner of the Santa Clara versus UC Davis game. UCSB was successful in a 15-9 win over BYU on February 15th but in a tournament of upsets the Gauchos will need to come out ready to play to make sure there is no reversal of that result.

"It's not about 5th place, not in our program, that's for sure," said Ramsey. "We're playing to finish the season with two wins and have a good time playing lacrosse."

Lacrosse Magazine On-Line Article

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