ERIE, Pa. – The Slippery Rock University field hockey team earned a 2-1 overtime victory over Mercyhurst University Tuesday at Saxon Stadium in Erie, Pennsylvania.
The non-conference victory against the Division I Lakers improves SRU's record to 4-11 overall and was The Rock's second win in their last three games. Mercyhurst drops to 0-13 following the loss.
Leading Slippery Rock to the win was
Bailee Christman, who scored both of SRU's goals while placing seven of her game-high 10 shots on target. The multi-goal game was her second of the season, she also scored twice in The Rock's season-opening victory against Frostburg State University.
Leslie Colliver and
Madison Shomo set up Christman's big day with one assist apiece. Colliver's assist was her third of the year while Shomo's was the first of her career.
Christina Clymer registered four shots, three of which were on target, while the duo of
Roz Mikulak and
Megan Rude each put attempts on goal as well to round out the offensive leaders.
Goalkeeper
Grace Burker made six saves on the way to her 22nd career victory and
Sammy Graci logged her third defensive save of the year to bolster a strong defensive effort. SRU has now allowed more than two goals in a game just once in its last nine outings.
The Rock held team advantages over the Lakers in total shots (16-10), shots on goal (12-8) and penalty corners (9-7).
SRU made its first shot of the day count as Christman provided The Rock with an early one-goal advantage when she scored on a Colliver assist in the ninth minute.
Slippery Rock went on to pepper the Lakers' cage with nine shots in the second quarter – five of which came from Christman – only for the Mercyhurst back line to fend off the onslaught and maintain its one-goal deficit heading into halftime.
Coming out of the halftime break, the Lakers pulled even with The Rock when Delfina Magro converted a penalty corner in the 34th minute to make it a 1-1 game. The stalemate lasted for the following 26 minutes as Mercyhurst and Slippery Rock traded big defensive stands in the second half.
The Lakers cleared four shots in the third quarter only for SRU to return the favor by withstanding a six-minute stretch in the fourth in which Mercyhurst fired off six shots thanks in no small part to three saves by Burker and one defensive stop from Graci to vault the game into overtime.
Similar to how the game started, neither team was able to log a shot in overtime for the opening seven minutes until Shomo found Christman who beat Kayla Desormeau for the game-winning goal at 67:33.
The score served as Christman's fifth overall goal of the year and the fifth game-winning shot of her career.
Slippery Rock returns to competition 2 p.m. Friday at fourth-ranked Bloomsburg University for its final game of the 2024 season.
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