PISCATAWAY, NJ – RV Rutgers women’s lacrosse (6-7, 0-5) returns home for its final two home games of the regular season, starting with a Big Ten Conference game against Ohio State (5-10, 0-5) on Thursday evening at SHI Stadium. The first drawing is set for 6:00 PM on the Big Ten Network, featuring Dean Linke and Taylor Thornton. WRSU (88.7 FM) will have a radio broadcast from Piscataway.
Admission and parking are free for all home games. Fans who plan to park should register their vehicles with the university through this link. Visitors only need to register their vehicle once for the entire season. Parking for the 2023 home games is in the Scarlet Lot outside the west entrance of SHI Stadium.
Tomorrow night will be the program’s Throwback Thursday game, with the first 400 fans in attendance receiving an exclusive Throwback Thursday Women’s Lacrosse T-Shirt.
- The Scarlet Knights picked up back-to-back non-conference wins last week – a 12-7 victory over No. 6 Stony Brook last Wednesday at SHI Stadium and a 15-7 triumph over Vermont last Saturday in Burlington.
- RU picked up its signature win of the season over the Seawolves, its third over a top-10 opponent under the head coach Melissa Lehman and the program’s first regular-season win over a top-six team in school history. The win avenged back-to-back losses to the Seawolves in the last two NCAA Tournaments and marked the first win over Stony Brook in the all-time series. RU allowed just two goals in the second half and held a 15-7 advantage in the tie to earn the marquee win in Piscataway.
- Junior goalkeeper Sofia Cardello registered 12 saves on the night and seven in the second half as Rutgers held the Seawolves well below their average of 32 shots per game with 23 attempts in the cage. The Scarlet Knights converted an impressive 15 of 16 clear attempts and won key possessions thanks to eight draw controls from the senior Megan Ball and six from a classmate Cassidy Spillis.
- Spilis (four goals, one assist), graduate student Marin Hartshorne (three goals) and rookie Ava Kane (three goals) all scored hat tricks for RU’s speed on offense while senior Jenna Byrne dished out three helpers to eclipse the 100-career point milestone.
- Featuring 11 different scorers against Vermont last Saturday, the Scarlet Knights scored first and never trailed against the Catamounts, using a 38-29 shooting advantage and a 6-0 third quarter run to secure the weekend win.
- With 182 career goals, Cassidy Spillis needs six goals to surpass the current volunteer assistant coach Taralin Naslonsky (187 of 2018-22) to record the programme. Spilis leads the team with 37 goals this season and has three or more goals in his last four games.
- Several Rutgers women’s lacrosse student-athletes earned individual honors after outstanding performances last week. Senior Cassidy Spillis was named the IWLCA co-Offensive National Player of the Week and Big Ten Linebacker of the Week. Graduate student Marin Hartshorne won Big Ten Offensive Player of the Week and Jr Sofia Cardello collected Co-Big Ten Defensive Player of the Week honors.
- With at least three games to go before the 2023 NCAA Tournament field is selected, Rutgers owns the No. 32 RPI in the country.
- Rutgers played eight teams that advanced to last year’s NCAA tournament.
- With their game against No. 4 James Madison on Sunday, the Scarlet Knights will finish the regular season having played 12 teams that participated or received votes in the 2023 IWLCA Coaches Poll.
- RU owns ranked wins over No. 6 Stony Brook and no. 19 Jacksonville.
- Ball leads the nation with 3.69 caused turnovers per game.
- Ball has caused 48 turnovers this season and had three or more turnovers in eight games during the spring campaign. Ball has recorded three or more turnovers 24 times during her storied career.
- Ball is second among active leaders nationally with 142 career sacks. She is just six behind Denver’s Sam Tucker at 148.
- Ball is the program’s all-time leader in caused turnovers (142) and draw controls (289), securing the program’s individual records in both categories earlier this season in a 15-8 win over Georgetown at SHI Stadium.
- Megan Ball
- CTs-Per-Game: 3.69 (first B1G, first NCAA)
- GBs-Per-Game: 3.23 (1st B1G, 11th NCAA)
- DCs-Per-Game: 6.31 (Second B1G, 17th NCAA)
- Cassidy Spillis
- Goals: 37 (Eighth B1G)
- Goals per game: 2.85 (Fifth B1G)
- Marin Hartshorne
- Assists: 21 (Fourth B1G)
- Assists per game: 1.62 (Fourth B1G)
- Points per game: 3.54 (seventh B1G)
- Jenna Byrne
- Assists: 18 (seventh B1G)
- Assists per game: 1.38 (sixth B1G)
- Sofia Cardello
- Save Percentage: .484 (Second B1G, 17th NCAA)
- Saves per game: 9.15 (Second B1G, 26th NCAA)
- Saves: 119 (Third B1G, 32nd NCAA)
- Goals Against Average: 10.34 (Fifth B1G, 24th NCAA)
- The Buckeyes enter Thursday night having lost a 17-11 game against No. 2 Northwestern last Saturday in Columbus.
- Jamie Lasda leads the team with 54 points, 29 assists and 25 goals. Nicole Ferrara is the team’s leading scorer with 37.
- OSU goalie Regan Alexander leads the Big Ten and is sixth nationally with 148 saves this season.
- Rutgers leads the all-time series with Ohio State, 8-5. The Scarlet Knights have won their last four meetings, all in the last two seasons.
- Ohio State will host the 2023 Big Ten Tournament semifinals and finals May 4-6 in Columbus.
- Rutgers closes its regular season Sunday against No. 4 James Madison. The first drawing is set for 1:00 p.m. and will be televised on Big Ten Plus. Sunday will be senior day as the program will recognize its three sophomores and seven seniors before the game.