W. Lax comeback too little, too late

The Quakers fell behind 8-1 before their furious comeback fell just short. Due to inclement weather on Sunday, the Penn women's lacrosse game scheduled for 1 p.m. on Franklin Field got off to a late start. Its contest with Harvard was delayed by nearly an hour, as extra time was needed to clear snow off the turf. But even after a warm water treatment made the field presentable, the competition still didn't get fully underway for almost another hour. After all, the Quakers didn't really show up until midway through the second half. Unfortunately, when Penn put together its 5-0 run to end the game, it was too little, too late. The Quakers came up short by two goals and fell, 11-9, to the Crimson. "It's frustrating to see them play the game in the last four minutes when it's an hour long," Penn coach Karin Brower said. Penn actually put the first goal on the board when freshman Crissy Book scored five minutes into the contest. But the Quakers held this advantage for just 90 seconds, and it was their only lead of the afternoon. Lizzy Frisbie countered and began a 5-0 run for the Crimson, who took a 5-1 lead into the locker room at halftime. The trend continued after intermission, as Harvard tallied three more unanswered goals before Penn's Traci Marabella finally restarted the Quakers offense after its 30-minute sabbatical. Penn outscored the Crimson, 7-3, from there in, but despite efforts by Marabella, senior captain Brooke Jenkins and freshman Kate Murray, Penn could not make up for its early mistakes. "We weren't aggressive; we didn't go to goal; we didn't challenge on attack; and we didn't run the plays well," Brower said. "They out-hustled us. I don't think they were a faster team than us, but they just wanted it more." The Quakers had already dropped their first two Ivy contests of the year against Yale and Cornell, and with their only win coming against Columbia, yesterday's loss puts them at 1-3 in the league. According to Brower, the same problems keep spelling defeat for her team. "Cornell, Yale and [Harvard] -- we could have won those games, but we looked intimidated," Brower said. "I don't know if it's inexperience or what, but they say that they think they can beat a team, and then they don't play that way." After losing to Harvard, the first-year coach couldn't even find comfort in what seems to be her greatest feat to date. The Quakers have put five wins together this season -- a marked improvement from last season's 1-12 record. "[Brower] has done a really nice job," Harvard coach Carole Kleinfelder said. "The team is obviously playing so much better than last year. But they're young, so they're still going to make a lot of nervous mistakes." But just being better than last year isn't enough for Brower. "The thing that really bothers me is that I feel like -- yeah, we're better than last year -- but that wasn't so hard to do," Brower said. "We've got to win a game that counts, and that's important. We've beaten the teams that we should beat. We need to beat a team when it's a close game." Judging by the 11-9 score, one would think the game against Harvard was one such close contest. But anyone who braved the weather and journeyed to Franklin Field on Sunday could tell you otherwise. Even though the last few minutes provided plenty of excitement and hope for the Penn faithful, Harvard held a commanding lead for most of the contest until Penn changed its offensive strategy in the final minutes. "I'd been telling them the whole game that they could take their kids to goal and then finally -- in the last four minutes -- they go to goal," Brower said. "We didn't challenge their defenders and then finally like [Murray] decided to take her girl to goal and she got three shots off." Some personnel changes by the Crimson late in the game also made the Red and Blue's job a little bit easier. "They did change their goalie, which helped a lot," Brower said. "But whether or not they switched the goalie, at least we were getting the shots off." In addition to pulling goal keeper Nora Guyer, Kleinfelder also cleared most of her bench. When asked if the new lineup contributed to Penn's late run, the Crimson coach did not hesitate to respond with, "Oh yeah, no question." "Of course, it was still nerve wracking since it was a game that we'd had total control over, but I got everybody in who was sitting on the bench. We didn't play as well, but I always had [the starters] to put back in to stop it," Kleinfelder said.

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.