THREE-PEAT: Women’s lacrosse beats Penn for third straight Ivy tournament championship

For the third consecutive year, Princeton women’s lacrosse (14–3, 6–1 Ivy) finished the season as the Ivy League tournament champions. On Friday, the No. 1 seed Tigers defeated Cornell to set up a finals matchup with Penn (12–5, 5–2), the same day the Quakers upset Dartmouth in the semifinals. On Saturday, Princeton pulled away from Penn in the second half to earn a 13–9 win and tournament championship. .

The game started with a draw control by Penn but after a turnover by senior defender Alex Argo, the Tigers gained control, allowing junior attacker Tess D’Orsi to score the first goal. In spite of the quick point early on in the game, the first half had both Princeton and Penn fighting for a lead. By the end of the period, the Tigers and Quakers were tied 6–6.

“Penn’s a really great team,” head coach Chris Sailer said. “It was an evenly matched first half.”

Going into the second half, D’Orsi put another one in the net for the Tigers, and from then on, Princeton took the lead. For the rest of the game, Penn fell short and was never able to catch up to the Tigers. Princeton took home the trophy, winning 13–9.

“I thought we played great in the second half,” Sailer said. “I was really proud of our kids for that and we did a good job offensively, and defensively we made some adjustments that frustrated [Penn] a little bit, and we played really good lacrosse all over the field including at the center draw.”

Leading the Tigers to victory was Kyla Sears with two goals and five assists. The sophomore attacker also took home the honor of Most Outstanding Player in the tournament.

“Kyla is just such a great lacrosse player. First of all, she’s incredibly skilled and has really good awareness and attacking mentality. This weekend she really did it all for us. She was fast on breaks, had some great individual moves on goal, and had fantastic feeds,” Sailer praised.

Senior attacker Elizabeth George was also a huge contributor of the game with five goals and one assist. D’Orsi had a total of three goals, followed by senior midfielder Kathryn Hallett, senior attacker Julia Haney, and senior attacker Allie Rodgers, who each put one in the net. Sophomore goalie Sam Fish had a total of nine saves.

Winning not only the Ivy League Tournament but also an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, the Tigers have put themselves in a good position for the last leg of the season. Having earned the seventh seed in the tournament, Princeton will host Wagner this Friday at Sherrerd Field.

“I think everybody knows in NCAA, it’s a whole new ball game. Everybody enters the tournament at the same place, zero and zero and it’s win and advance or if you don’t win your season ends,” Sailer said. “So, there’s an urgency about every single game because it has the potential to be your last game of the season and you’re going to play really good teams all the way throughout. For us, the focus stays the same. It’s just improving everyday at practice, putting in the time to prepare really well for our competitors, taking the field with confidence, and trying to play our best game on game day.”