Box Score

ROCK ISLAND, Ill. – It was only fitting that on "Senior Day" the lone senior on the Augustana women's lacrosse roster would come up big in leading the Vikings to a 16-9 College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin victory over Elmhurst on Saturday, April 28 at Thorson-Lucken Field. Goalkeeper Annalia Fowler (York HS, Elmhurst, Ill.) turned back 15 Bluejay shots and picked up six ground balls and had a caused turnover as Augustana won for the second straight time to close out the season.
 
Fowler stopped 10 Elmhurst shots in the first half as the Vikings clawed their way to a 6-5 lead. Junior Carla Bennett (Marian Catholic HS, South Holland, Ill.) gave the home team the early lead when she scored unassisted at 28:04. However, the Bluejays tallied three straight times to take a 3-1 lead before Augustana answered with goals by junior Christina McCabe (Maine South HS, Park Ridge, Ill.) at 20:58 and Bennett at 20:46 to tie the game 3-3.
 
The first six goals of the game were all unassisted.
 
Elmhurst went on top 4-3 with a goal by Ellen Brown with 18:19 left in the first half. That would be the last lead of the day for the visitors as junior Bailey Aasen (Park HS, Cottage Grove, Minn.) hit the back of the net twice. Her first goal at 12:11 came off an assist from McCabe and that tied things 4-4. Her next goal was off a free position shot at 7:43 and that put the Vikings ahead.
 
Bennett scored with 3:50 left off a free position situation to make it 6-4 but Elmhurst's Isabel Walker scored with 2:57 left to trim the advantage to 6-5 at halftime.
 
The Bluejays opened the scoring in the second half with a goal by Grace Knoebel less than a minute (29:17) into play. That evened things up at 6-6 but the Vikings scored the next seven goals to take complete command of the game. McCabe scored four straight times between the 24:59 mark and 16:15 with three of those being free positions and one being unassisted. After her fourth straight goal the Augustana lead was 10-6. Junior Emily Lucnik (Schaumburg HS, Schaumburg, Ill.) scored off an Aasen assists at 15:54 to make it 11-6 and Aasen tallied at 12:34 to run the lead to 12-6. Sophomore Lauren Amella (Whitney Young HS, Chicago, Ill.) got the seventh and final goal in the run with Bennett assisting at 11:23 to put the advantage at 13-6.
 
Down the stretch Aasen scored twice and Lucnik once with McCabe getting a pair of assists to account for the final score of 16-9.
 
McCabe and Aasen each had five goals while Bennett had three, Lucnik two and Amella one. McCabe led the way with three assists.
 
The Vikings won 17 of 27 draw controls and were successful on 21 of 25 clear attempts. Fowler's six ground balls led the team in that category while Aasen picked up five.  
 
Augustana ends the season with an 8-7 overall record and a 2-4 mark in the CCIW. It is the seventh consecutive winning season recorded by the Vikings since the program started prior to the 2012 campaign. Elmhurst fell to 5-10 and 0-6.