San Diego State lacrosse defeated Fresno State, 18-15, on April 26 at Aggie Stadium in Davis, California.
The Aztecs (10-7) are set to face UC Davis (9-7) in the finals of the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation finals on Sunday. This marks the second year in a row where these two teams meet with the conference championship on the line.
“We came out with a lot of energy. We played really hard. I thought we were very composed,” head coach Kylee White said. “That was really our gameplan to play for each other.”
The front three of senior midfielder Harlowe Steele, senior attacker Kirstie Greenlaw and redshirt sophomore attacker Lexi Tan led the way for the Aztecs in scoring.
Steele had a personal best of five goals on nine shot attempts, along with two ground balls. She is now only four goals away from becoming SDSU’s second 100-goal scorer.
Greenlaw scored five goals on 12 shot attempts, adding one assist and one ground ball. Tan tallied four goals and two ground balls.
“We were setting Harlowe and Kirstie up,” White said. “Lexi is just so lethal in goal right now. When she gets in goal, she’s a great finisher.”
Redshirt junior goalkeeper Katy Sharretts recorded 16 saves, which was the most in SDSU history for a match and two shy of tying her own personal best. This was the seventh game of the year in which Sharretts recorded double-digit saves.
At the end of the first half, Fresno State had a slight lead of 8-7 over the Aztecs. Coincidentally, this was the same scoreline from their regular-season matchup less than a week ago.
The difference was this time SDSU started the match on a 5-1 run (whereas Fresno State led 6-1 last week) and allowed the Bulldogs to go on a 7-2 run as time expired in the first period.
“You can’t get comfortable with a team like Fresno. If you get a lead like that, you can’t ever be comfortable” White said. “We allowed just enough to let them back in.”
By securing ground balls and draw controls, the play of the Aztecs’ midfield allowed for the team to possess the ball and offensively break away from the Bulldogs in the final period.
Sophomore midfielder Bailey Brown grabbed six draw controls and three ground balls. Senior midfielder Jill Haight had three draw controls, forced two turnovers and one ground ball.
“We figured out how to breakdown their defense. Draw controls were such a big part of this game again,” White said. “We got the draw control and were able to get on the offense to get the
looks that we wanted.”
The Aztecs’ quest to repeat as conference champions continues in their match against UC Davis on Sunday, April 28 at 1:00 p.m. at Aggie Stadium.
“We’re very confident. We think player to player we’re the stronger team,” White said. “We don’t have to play a perfect game; we just need to play a unified, connected hard game and play for 60 minutes. If we let up at all, they are going to capitalize.”
