Familiarity is overrated.
At least that’s what the play of the Oregon women’s lacrosse team suggested last weekend, when the Ducks swept both of their games against opponents the program had never played before.
The No. 19 Ducks’ home opener this Saturday at Papé Field won’t be much different.
Oregon (3-1 overall, 1-1 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation) plays host to the Le Moyne Dolphins tomorrow at 1 p.m., the team’s first home game of the season. The game will be broadcast live on the radio on KWVA, 88.1 FM.
“I think we’re on a good roll here,” said senior Jen May, the MPSF co-player of the week.
The Ducks’ three-game winning streak is one short of the longest in school history.
That Oregon will be playing against a new opponent is the only similarity between last weekend and this, however.
Coach Jen Larsen’s team entered last weekend after a “disappointing” 1-1 start to the conference season, then proceeded to knock off Virginia Tech and then-No. 18 Richmond.
Now, with a boost of confidence, Oregon prepares for Le Moyne as the target, not the underdog role it is so used to.
“We sort of have a bullseye on our chest,” said Larsen. “We like being the underdog and we need to make sure we’re not sitting on our laurels.”
In the Dolphins (1-1 overall), Oregon will find a veteran team with NCAA tournament experience, making the tournament as the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference’s automatic seed four of the past six seasons by virtue of winning its conference.
The Dolphins won’t have the luxury of an automatic bid anymore. The Mid-American Athletic Conference booted the school’s women’s lacrosse and baseball teams-its only two Division I programs-out last spring, without much warning. Both teams are now playing as independents.
This season, the lacrosse team is still playing a MAAC schedule, but isn’t eligible for its postseason tournament, and thus an automatic entry into the 16-team NCAA tournament.
“We have the opportunity to do something different now,” Le Moyne coach Lauren O’Conner told the Syracuse Post-Standard. “I’ve told them, ‘We’ve conquered the MAAC. Let’s go on and do something else.’”
The Dolphins return five all-MAAC players, including attacker Lisa McCarthy, who scored three goals against Stanford on Feb. 2, and leads the team with seven points. Whitney Vecchio, another all-MAAC attacker, is second with six points, including three goals in the Dolphins’ win against Cincinnati on Feb. 23.
The Ducks are expecting a tough game from the “scrappy” Dolphins, freshman Alex Breiner said.
“The problem with the other teams, especially Richmond, was they weren’t ready for us,” said Breiner, who is tied for fifth on the roster with five goals. “They looked at us like ‘We’re Oregon,’ and it’s only our fourth year. That’s what we can’t do with Le Moyne.”
Oregon isn’t without its statistical merits, either, leading the MPSF in shots (29), goals (13.25), and points (17.25) per game.
With two notable East Coast victories behind them, the Ducks’ coach is trying to avoid complacency.
“We don’t want the Virginia weekend to be our best performance of the year,” said Larsen.
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