The Colgate women’s lacrosse team endured another tough two loss to outstanding opponents, this time falling to No 14 Penn State by a score of 17-7 and Cornell 10-9 last night. Junior Kate Bergstrom scored three goals in the Raider defeat against Cornell. The Raiders fell to 1-3 on the year, but both losses have come to national powerhouses, the other being at the hands of the Syracuse Orange.

As expected, the heavily favored Nittany Lions came out flying. Straight off the opening draw, Penn State chalked up their first tally, and put in three more before Colgate senior Meghan Lawler could stop the bleeding momentarily with a goal off a feed from junior Colleen Bubnack. Any momentum the Raiders gained from this goal vanished quickly, however, as the Nittany Lions came back with four more unanswered goals to make it 8-1. Again, Colgate deposited one score, this time from sophomore Greer Goebels, only to have Penn State score five more goals, upping their lead to 13-2.

“Knowing that you’re about to play a top 20 team definitely adds extra pressure,” sophomore Courtney Miller said. “So once we stepped foot in the dome at Penn State, we all felt a little intimidated. Trying to adjust to the level of play was definitely a contributing factor in our rough start against them.”

At 13-2, the Raiders seemed to find their sea legs and start playing good lacrosse. In fact, the Raiders would outscore Penn State, 5-4, over the rest of the game. The first two goals came in the last 1:39 of the first half, with Miller picking up her first of three goals on the day, while first-year Quincey Spagnoletti tallied the other. On the other side of the intermission, Colgate made it three unanswered goals, as Goebels assisted Bubnack on her third score of the year. Penn State responded quickly, but Miller scored again to bring the score to 14-6. The Nittany Lions went on to score three consecutive goals from there, with Miller scoring one last tally for Colgate in the final seconds, finalizing the score at 17-7. Although the Raiders lost, they can look to how they played in the second half as a positive heading into their next game.

“We’re a team that takes a while to adjust to certain teams we face, especially top 20 teams,” Miller said. “Once we get used to the girls, and get to see a little bit of how they play, we can battle with them and make up some time and really take it to them all the way to the end of the game.”