Last weekend was the most successful of the year so far for the Colgate women’s lacrosse team. On Friday, Colgate traveled to Lafayette and preserved second place in the Patriot League with a 15-8 victory. Two days later, on the second annual Springcoming, the Raiders took on No. 20 Florida at home, and earned the upset, 12-11, in a thrilling double overtime.

Sophomore midfielder Courtney Miller starred offensively for Colgate, scoring nine goals on the weekend, with four on Friday and five on Sunday. Senior midfielder Meghan Lawler also produced offensively, scoring three goals to go along with seven assists in the two-game span.

Sophomore goaltender Christina Roa was almost impeccable in net, stopping 13 shots on Friday and 16 on Sunday. Roa currently has 163 saves this season.

Last Friday, the Raiders traveled to Easton, PA. After falling 1-0 to the Leopards three minutes into the game, Colgate got right to work, scoring three unanswered goals in a seven-minute span. Junior midfielder Colleen Bubnack tied the game for the Raiders at 3:17. Almost three minutes later, Miller gave Colgate a lead it would not relinquish throughout the rest of the game.

Ten minutes into the competition, Lawler scored her first of the game to give the Raiders a 3-1 lead. After Lafayette scored a minute later, the Raiders once again scored three consecutive goals to take a 6-2 lead in a span of just 70 seconds.

Colgate then suffered a one-minute letdown in which the Leopards scored three goals to cut the Raider lead to one. Colgate regained control of the game in the final third of the first session, outscoring Lafayette 3-1. The Raiders thus entered the second portion of the game leading, 9-6.

In the second half, Colgate exerted full control over the Leopards. After trading goals in the first seven minutes of the stanza, the score was 10-7, but the Raiders would not let that last for long. Colgate scored five unanswered goals, each of which waswas scored by a different player. This quintet included Miller, who tallied her fourth of the game.

Late in the contest, with 46 seconds left, Lafayette responded, thus making the final score of the game 15-8. With the victory, the Raiders clinched a berth in the Patriot League tournament.

“I definitely don’t think that clinching the tournament berth has made a difference on our team,” Roa said. “We are more focused than ever and are ready to take on Lehigh and Bucknell.”

On Sunday afternoon, Colgate returned to the friendly confines of Tyler’s field to face the No. 20 Florida Gators.

Early in the game, Florida showed why it was the heavily-favored squad among the two. The Gators scored five of the contest’s first six goals in the first ten minutes, taking a

commanding 5-1 lead.

Florida controlled the game until the 25:41 mark, when Miller gave Colgate new life. With three seconds left in the half, first-year midfielder Quincey Spagnoletti scored off an assist by Lawler, to increase the possibilities of a Raider comeback.

The second session of the game was Colgate’s best of the season. The Raiders outscored Florida 6-3, led by Miller and junior attack Kate Bergstrom’s two goals, which sent the game into overtime. The Gators scored 24 seconds into the first overtime, but Colgate quickly answered back, sending the game to a second extra session. Three minutes into the double overtime, Miller scored her fifth one of the game, capping off what is arguably the most important victory in the history of the program.

“The win against Florida was one of the greatest in our program’s history and it was a demonstration of how much potential our team has when it plays with intensity for an entire game,” Roa said. “This gave our team confidence we will need for our upcoming games and served as proof that we can play and

defeat ranked teams.”

The Raiders will next take the field at Bucknell this Saturday, April 17. The game is slated to begin at 1 p.m.

Contact Jaime Heilbron at [email protected].