SOUTH BEND, Ind. — The Irish women’s lacrosse program continued their strong start to the 2024 season with a season-high 25 goals as they rolled to a 25-3 win over in-state foe Butler. The 22 goal margin of victory was also a season high for the Notre Dame women.
Abby Maichin got the scoring going just1:38 into play Sunday afternoon after Abby Lyons forced a turnover on the opening Bulldog possession.
The Irish won the ensuing draw as MK Doherty picked up the ball in the circle. A short offensive setup led to a goal from Kasey Choma to make it a 2-0 contest early in the first quarter.
Kelly Denes kept the momentum going with a rocket of a shot shortly thereafter to jump out to the quick 3-0 lead.
The Irish kept rolling with goals from Madison Ahern, Keelin Schlageter, Jackie Wolak and Arden Tierney gave the home squad the 10-0 lead through the first 15 minutes of play.
Butler got the first goal of the second frame as they cut the Irish lead to nine but the Irish responded with the next six tallies to take the 16-1 lead into the halftime break. Goals in the second quarter came from Doherty, Tierney, Choma, Ahern and Timarky with Doherty and Ahern both notching hat tricks with their play in quarter two. Timarky’s goal with just 13 seconds left in the half sparked her eventual hat-trick performance, finishing the day with three goals for a career best.
New goalkeepers appeared for both teams at the start of the second half with Izzie Pithie taking over in the Irish cage. Lilly Callahan, who received the starting nod, finished the day with one save and one goal against.
The Bulldogs scored again to open the second half but the rest of the quarter belonged to the Irish who added four more goals while Pithie tallied an additional two saves to keep the Bulldogs out of the net for the 20-2 lead heading into the final quarter.
Timarky notched her career-high third goal of the day to give the Irish the 21-2 lead less than a minute into the fourth quarter before Ciara Mazzone and Meghan O’Hare each scored their firsts of the afternoon.
Butler scored once more with 5:32 to play in the contest but a pair of goals from Kathryn Morrissey finished the day off with the Irish capping off a 25-3 win.
With the win, the team improves to 4-0 on the season for the first time since 2020.
KEY STATS
- The Irish were nearly perfect on the clear Sunday afternoon, marking a 17-of-18 success rate on turning defense into offense.
- The Notre Dame women were perfect while on the man-advantage, posting four goals while they had the edge.
- The team outshot Butler 42-11 in the contest while the Irish goalkeeping duo of Callahan and Pithie combined for five saves on the day.
- Nine individuals tallied multiple goals Sunday against the Bulldogs, led by Doherty, Ahern and Timarky who all had hat tricks. Choma, Wolak, Tierney, Mazzone, Frieri and Morrissey each tallied two goals in the contest.
- Creating havoc on defense, Grace Weigand and Abby Lyons each caused multiple turnovers as the team combined for 11 on the day. With four ground balls in addition to her two caused turnovers, Lyons led the team in the category.
- A force at the circle, Doherty led the team in draw controls with seven while the team held the edge in draws 20-10.
- With four saves in the second half of the game, Pithie doubled her previous career-high. She finished the day with a .667 save percentage.
WHAT THEY’RE SAYING
“Being able to have such a quick turnaround, four games in 10 days to open the season, and a quick turnaround from Friday night just speaks volumes to our team’s ability to recover and peak again.
“We’ve really been keyed into our consistency and disciplining ourselves so that our consistency can also be a weapon.” – Head Coach Christine Halfpenny
UP NEXT
The Irish keep the momentum going at home next weekend with an afternoon contest against No. 5 Syracuse on Saturday, February 24 at noon. The game anticipated to be a top-10 matchup and will be Notre Dame’s ACC 2024 opener.