Stunning W. Lax turns table on 'stronger team'

Defense reversed history last night.

The Penn women's lacrosse team had never won a game in five tries against Johns Hopkins. But that changed in a hurry when the No. 14 Quakers thrashed the No. 12 Blue Jays 12-4 in Baltimore.

"This was our biggest win of the year," coach Karin Brower said. "They've been ranked ahead of us all year . even though we went in thinking we were the stronger team.

"We have a lot of scoring power, so I felt good about that," she said. "This is definitely the best team we've had defensively."

Beating Johns Hopkins (5-4) for the first time ever made the upset even more meaningful.

"They always get respect in the rankings, and we never do," senior tri-captain Chrissy Muller said. "Last year we only lost 12-9, but we knew we could hang with them. This time we knew we were the better team the whole time."

Two years ago in Baltimore, the scoreboard read a reversed result - 13-4 in favor of the Blue Jays.

The circumstances surrounding that game were similar to last night's. The Blue Jays were ranked 12th two years ago; this year they are tied for 12th with Vanderbilt. The Quakers were ranked 13th; now, they're No. 14.

However, this time the Quakers (7-1) used the winning formula that's worked for them this year: tough defense and an offensive spurt.

On the defensive side, the Quakers only gave up one first-half goal (compared to the seven goals that they scored). In addition, the Quakers were also able to shutdown Hopkins stud Mary Key, who coming into the game led the nation in points per game (7.88), goals per game (4.13) and assists per game (3.75). She only had three points (one goal and two assists) last night.

"Clearly Mary Key is someone we were looking out for," Brower said. "Our strategy worked really well against her. We talked to the team about doubling her at the right moment, and Hilary Renna did an excellent job of guarding her one-on-one defensively. The team didn't stress out when Hilary was guarding her."

Renna, a sophomore, also had a similar lights-out performance against Yale attacker Lauren Taylor earlier this month, holding the junior to one goal despite her 5.2 goals per game average.

After the Quakers scored the first three goals of the game within eight minutes, it took the Blue Jays another five minutes to get their first tally.

But the Quakers responded with a run of eight unanswered scores.

During this run, junior attacker Chelsea Kocis scored three goals, earning her first career hat trick. Yet she did not take any individual credit for the win.

"We saw how well our defense was playing, how well our goalie was playing, and we wanted to play well for them," Kocis said. "They were holding Mary Key, one of the best players in the country, to basically nothing and as attackers we just wanted to put the ball in the net to help out our defense."

And though Muller felt annoyed by the lack of respect from the rankings committee, her team found the perfect solution.

Win.

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