Penn State bounced back from Saturday's stunning loss to Michigan, in which it surrendered two goals in the final six seconds to lose 12-11, by upsetting Northwestern 21-16 to advance to Sunday's Big Ten championship game.
It was a huge win for a Penn State program that has advanced to back-to-back national semifinals, but finds itself on the NCAA tournament selection bubble this year and came into the Big Ten tournament having lost four straight games.
Penn State can get rid of any selection doubt by winning the Big Ten tournament, but will have to get through defending national champion Maryland in order to secure the league's automatic bid. The Terps downed Johns Hopkins 16-11 in the other Big Ten semifinal in Ann Arbor, Mich.
The Nittany Lions got off to a terrible start on Friday, as Northwestern's Sheial Nesselbush scored just 13 seconds into the game, but Penn State's Kayla Brisolari scored just 36 seconds later and the Nits never trailed again.
With the score tied 5-5, Madison Carter scored the first of five straight Penn State goals and scored four times in a run that eventually went 8-1 in the Nittany Lions favor. Carter finished the game with six goals and Maria Auth also had a huge game with three goals and five assists.
GOAL Speed Kills!! Maria Auth races by the defense scoring her third goal of the game and setting a new career-high with eight points!! Penn State leads 20-14!! #WeAre #PSUWLAX pic.twitter.com/aHxlFwFPkc
— Penn State Women’s Lacrosse (@PennStateWLAX) May 5, 2018
Northwestern used a three-goal run to pull within 15-11 with 19 minutes to play, but Penn State answered with a three-goal run of its own and kept the game out of reach.
Selena Lasota led Northwestern with six goals.
PHOTO BY RICHARD PALAKIS II
Grace Griffin had four goals to help Maryland to a 16-11 win over Johns Hopkins in the semifinal round of the Big Ten championship. Maryland and Penn State will meet for the conference title on Sunday in Ann Arbor, Mich.
Johns Hopkins, which sits squarely on the bubble for an NCAA tournament spot, had much more on the line than Maryland in Friday's first semifinal. The loss sends the Blue Jays to 10-8, including five one-goal losses, but Hopkins does own a win over Loyola.
After Hopkins had scored three straight goals to pull within 8-4 late in the first half, Maryland scored three times in the final 2:46 of the half and stretched its lead to as big as 10 goals in the second half before Johns Hopkins scored the final five goals of the game.
Caroline Steele paced Maryland with five goals and two assists and Grace Griffin scored four times. Megan Taylor made 11 saves for the Terps to earn the win. Mackenzie Heidberg led Johns Hopkins with four goals and two assists.
Here's a look at the other six NCAA Division I women's conferences that staged their semifinals on Friday.
JMU and Towson Set for Rematch
James Madison and Towson have been the top two teams in the Colonial Athletic Association all season and they're ready for round two of conference bragging rights. JMU edged Towson 17-16 on the Tigers home field last weekend. They'll meet again Sunday at JMU for the league's postseason championship.
JMU blitzed Delaware 9-1 in the opening half on the way to a 17-5 victory in the semifinals. Kristen Gaudian, who scored the game-winner on Sunday against Towson, led the Dukes with five goals and Caroline Sdanowich and Rebecca Tooker each had five caused turnovers.
Kiley Keating was stellar in goal as Towson held off a game effort from Elon, beating the Phoenix 9-7. Towson never trailed in the contest, and used a four-goal run in the first half to build a 5-1 lead, but Elon kept coming. The Phoenix scored three straight in a span of 2:45 to cut the Towson lead to 9-7 with eight minutes to play, but neither team scored down the stretch.
Kiley Keating with another point blank save, her 10th stop of the game WATCH LIVE #7 @Towson_WLAX vs @ElonWLax in the @CAASports semifinal on the LSN app or direct link: https://t.co/7sgacGIJRT #CAAChamps pic.twitter.com/GfEjzhBJv6
— Lax Sports Network (@LaxSportsNet) May 5, 2018
Natalie Sulmonte led Towson with four goals and Emily Gillingham and Carly Tellekamp each scored twice.
Penn Gets Another Shot at Princeton
Penn dominated the first half and held off a late rally to beat Dartmouth 16-14 and set up a rematch with Princeton in Sunday's Ivy League championship game. Princeton, one of the hottest teams in the country, beat Columbia 17-7 in Saturday's second semifinal.
Princeton has now won seven of its last eight games, with the lone loss coming by a single goal to Maryland in a game in led by four in the second half. Including in the winning stretch was a 21-8 blowout of Penn on April 25.
On Friday, Princeton spoiled Columbia's Ivy League tournament debut by scoring the first 10 goals of the game. Ellie McNulty, Kyla Sears and Tess D'Orsi all scored four goals for the Tigers and Elizabeth George added three goals and 11 draw controls.
Penn led 10-4 at the half and had a comfortable 15-7 lead with 18 minutes left in the second half, but Dartmouth stormed back and pulled to within 16-14 on Katie Bourque's goal with 3:08 remaining. Dartmouth won the ensuing draw, but turned the ball over and didn't get a shot off until 31 seconds remained in the game. After a pair of shots went wide, Penn goalie Mikaila Cheeseman made a save with 18 seconds left to wrap up the game.
Elyse Decker led Penn with five goals and Gabby Rosenzweig (2g, 5a) and Emily Rogers-Healion (1g, 5a) played a big role in the Quakers offense.
Freshman Elyse Decker has been on fire this afternoon, making her 5th goal of the game. pic.twitter.com/vVwuoeDml7
— Penn Women's Lax (@PennWomensLax) May 4, 2018
Dartmouth, a bubble team for the NCAA tournament, was led by Bourque (4g, 1a) and Kierra Sweeney (3g, 1a). The Big Green are 11-5 with a win over Princeton, but have losses to two unranked teams - Brown and Massachusetts.