Women's Lacrosse | 5/4/2011 4:06:00 PM
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ROCHESTER, NY - The RIT women's lacrosse team will travel to Stevens this weekend for the 2011 Empire 8 Championships. RIT, seeded fourth, will play the top-seeded Ducks in one semifinal on Saturday at 12 p.m. Second-seeded Nazareth, will play Ithaca, seeded third in the second semifinal, also at Stevens on Saturday at 2:30 p.m. The winners of the semifinals will meet in the Empire 8 Championship on Sunday. The winner of that game receives an automatic berth into the 2011 NCAA Tournament. RIT finished Empire 8 play with a 5-3 record, and is 6-10 overall.
Sophomore #
Shelby Vakiener (Fairport, NY/Fairport)# leads the way offensively for the Tigers this season, continuing her assault on the RIT record books. She enters Saturday's game needing just one more goal to tie and two to break the single-season record at RIT. Last week, she became just the sixth player to tally 100 career goals at RIT. Vakiener, who broke the RIT single-season record for points earlier in the year, has 57 goals and 27 assists in 16 games this season, and 141 points (102-39-141) in just 32 career games.
Six Tigers have at least 10 goals this season. Junior #
Rebecca Lampson (Penn Yan, NY/Penn Yan Academy) needs just two goals to become just the sixth Tiger to record 40 in one season. She is second on the squad in scoring with 52 points on 38 goals and 14 assists. Junior (Westwood, MA/Westwood)Megan Henriksen (Silver Spring, MD/Our Lady of Good Counsel)# is third on the team in scoring with 26 goals and 33 points, while recording 28 ground balls and 15 caused turnovers.
Stevens finished the regular season with an 8-0 record in Empire 8 play and were 13-3 overall. Six Ducks have at least 33 points, with Michelle Buonacuore leading the way with 58 on 32 goals and 26 assists. Christine Smith leads the team with 43 goals, while Pamela Loria has 34 goals and 20 assists. Smith also leads the team with 68 draw controls. Kate Cox and Ashley Carey anchor the Ducks defense, with 27, and 26 caused turnovers, respectively.
It is a rematch of last year's Empire 8 semifinal, won by the Ducks, 16-14. Vakiener recorded five points in that game. Just two weeks ago, the Ducks came from three goals down to defeat RIT 14-10 in overtime. Vakiener sent the game to overtime, scoring her fifth goal of the game with 25 seconds left. Stevens scored the only four goals of overtime, as Buonacuore led the Ducks with four talies. Stevens leads the all-time series between the two schools, 6-0.
