The Oregon lacrosse team upped its offense in the second half to take down San Diego State in its MPSF opener match on Saturday afternoon at Papé Field.
While Oregon scored four goals in the first period, the Ducks rallied after halftime to bring the score to 11-9 to improve to 2-0 overall.
In Oregon’s last two matches against San Diego State, the latter took the match with one point. Under the new leadership of head coach Katrina Dowd, Oregon finally exacted revenge with two points to spare.
“Last year, it came down to the last second against them, so definitely feel a little bit of redemption,” Oregon attacker Shannon Williams said.
The first period was relatively sleepy, with a total of six goals finding their way into the back of the net. In the second period, both teams fired the ball into the goal 14 times.
“We were just careless with the ball a little bit,” Dowd said. “[We] gotta put our shots away overall. San Diego State [is] a well-coached team. They played hard the whole game and they kept fighting back. I’m proud that we could handle their run in the second half.”
Coming off their win against Michigan last weekend, Dowd said that the Ducks wanted to focus on the draw. Oregon had a 14-8 advantage over the Aztecs in the draw on Saturday.
Ten minutes into the second period, Oregon attacker Cambi Cukar capitalized on a transition opportunity to land a goal, kick-starting her birthday on a good note. She also contributed to two assists.
Williams was the top scorer for the Ducks against San Diego State, clocking in at four goals.
“I thought she had the hot hand and was just really confident behind the net,” Dowd said.
Though the sunny weather provided better playing conditions than last weekend’s rain, only 66 people filled the stands. Lacrosse will only be included in the Pac-12 conference in 2018 when Arizona State fields a team, bringing the minimum number of teams to six to qualify for a conference championship and NCAA automatic-qualifying bid.
The only other varsity sport in Oregon that is not included in the Pac-12 Conference is acrobatics and tumbling.
Oregon will next play face off against Canisius at Papé Field on Monday at 1 p.m.
Follow Romaine Soh on Twitter @mainetainpls