The game is not over until the clock hits zero. And for the No. 6 Michigan women’s lacrosse team needed all four quarters to achieve victory against No. 8 Johns Hopkins Sunday afternoon.
While the Wolverines’ (14-1, 4-1) offense got off to a rocky start against the Blue Jays (10-5 overall, 2-3 Big Ten) and trailed by four at halftime, they erupted in the second half to complete the comeback for a 13-9 win.
The first quarter was plagued with offensive struggles for Michigan including missed draw controls, turnovers and penalties. Because senior attacker Lily Montemarano excels on draw controls, that problem was uncharacteristic for the Wolverines.
“We had the first draw and then we didn’t get too many after that,” Michigan coach Hannah Nielsen said. “We gave up a couple of penalties as well. We really just kind of dug ourselves a bit of a hole there in the first half.”
Despite surrendering the first goal to start the game four minutes into the first quarter, the Wolverines weren’t completely quiet on the offense. Thirty seconds later, junior attacker Jane Fetterolf fired the ball to the left side of the net to get Michigan on the board. But Johns Hopkins scored three unanswered goals within the next seven minutes. One minute after the Blue Jays’ final goal, Michigan reduced the deficit when junior attacker Jill Smith rocketed the ball to the top right corner of the net. However, those goals didn’t mean much, as Johns Hopkins led 4-2 to end the quarter.
The Wolverines hoped to change the momentum around in the second quarter. But Michigan continued to struggle with turnovers, giving the Blue Jays more possession of the ball. As the Wolverines’ offense squandered opportunities, Johns Hopkins capitalized and tacked on two more goals. But Smith responded with a goal of her own for the Wolverines with 7:56 left. Smith scored another goal with one minute remaining, but Michigan still went into halftime down 8-4.
“Halftime came at a really good time for us to reset, and we just said we have to be more aggressive,” Nielsen said. “We have to be smarter with the ball.”
And that offensive aggressiveness — instead of just holding the ball and running down the clock — paid off as the Wolverines’ offense surged by taking more shots in the third quarter.
“We just played with a different level of intensity,” Nielsen said. “We were attacking the pressure instead of being passive against it.”
That increase in shots led to four straight goals for Michigan including one by Montemarano, two from senior midfielder Ava Class and one from junior midfielder Katharine Merrifield. The Wolverines erased the deficit as they kept the Blue Jays scoreless and entered the final frame with a blank slate and plenty of momentum.
Michigan continued that offensive aggressiveness in the first two minutes of the quarter as Fetterolf and junior attacker Kaylee Dyer slammed one home each. After struggling to get anything going in the first half, the Wolverines’ offense ignited at the right time. The fireworks continued for Michigan from there as it drove three more to the back of the net.
While Johns Hopkins struggled offensively, as the Wolverines did in the first half, Michigan’s offensive struggles were a distant memory as Smith added two of the three goals. One of those goals came on a free position shot and the other on a man-up advantage. Those goals helped Smith set the new program record for career goals with 125 total.
“We did clean things up and we were able to play a little bit more with a little bit more intensity and aggressiveness or aggression which helped us put goals in the back of the net in the second half,” Nielsen said.
And as that intensity helped the offense finally find its footing, the Wolverines’ defense did its job and only allowed one goal from Johns Hopkins in the second half to give Michigan the win.
On Sunday, the Wolverines proved that it isn’t out of a game until the clock hits zero.