Only in her second season as Siena women’s lacrosse head coach, Abigail Rehfuss’ has led her team early on in the season to top in the MAAC conference. Since the middle of February till now, the women’s lacrosse team has taken down opponents one by one to reach this title.
The Saints started their road of victories in their game versus St. Bonaventure. The team as a whole put up 18 points against their contenders with red-shirt freshman Kaitlyn Dowsett scoring a career high of five points. Goalie Sammy Horton started off her strong senior year campaign in this game with eight saves, bringing her team to an 18-6 victory. Winning this game on the road was an impressive win for the Saints, and it gave them confidence going into their MAAC conference game schedule.
The team’s first MAAC opponent were the Iona Gaels. The game was hosted by the Saints and brought another stellar performance from the Saints. The underclassmen trio of Nicole McNeely, Kerry Gerety, and Dowsett each scored, leading to the Saints victory. McNeely scored three goals and had five assists while Gerety had four goals and three assists. Dowsett once again scored five points for the Saints. They took the game 17-7, and scored over ten goals in four other games leading up to this.
In their game against Canisius, the Golden Griffs proved to be a tougher opponent for the Saints. The Griffs Jourdan Roemer was a major contender for Gerety, shutting her down in draw controls. However, sophomore Hayley Kmack made her team victorious in overtime, where her goal at 19 seconds left brought the Saints to win 17-16.
The Manhattan Jaspers brought the Saints to their only MAAC loss of the season thus far at home. Several of the Jaspers outscored the Saints, and held them only to a mere six points for the day. McNeely and Dowsett both scored for the Saints and added on assists for the team. However, the squad’s winning streak was broken with this 8-6 loss to the Jaspers.
The next game versus Niagara was senior Sammy Horton’s best of the season, making twelve saves for the Saints. The following week Horton was named the MAAC conference defensive player of the week because of this performance. McNeely had five goals for the Saints while Gerety scored twice bringing the Saints to a 12-8 win over the Purple Eagles. After this game, the Saints moved to 3-1 in the MAAC conference.
In the most recent MAAC game for the women’s lacrosse team, the squad took the top spot in the MAAC conference because of their win over the Monmouth Hawks. Sophomore Kerry Gerety scored three goals and had one assist. With this win, the Saints eight wins so far this season is the most for the squad since 2015. Also, the eight victories tie a program record for third most wins in a season. The Saints have not defeated the Monmouth Hawks since 1997, a first in program history.
The Saints have yet to play Fairfield University, Quinnipiac and Marist College before the MAAC tournament. However, sitting on top of the conference for now is a great step toward the MAAC tournament in May.