In an unusually scheduled Thursday afternoon game at Tenney Stadium, Marist women’s lacrosse dropped their second home game of the year, losing to Hofstra 14-8. The game was rescheduled from its original time on Wednesday in order to clear the field after the recent snowstorm.
The two schools have a lot of recent history against one another; they have faced off every season since 2022, with Marist’s only win coming in 2023, when they prevailed 14-12 in a game at Hofstra.
With the loss, Marist fell to 1-4 after the team struggled in head coach Keith Detelj’s first two seasons with only six combined wins. This year, the team entered projected to finish eighth in the MAAC, and their out-of-conference play so far has proven challenging. The only win of the season came in the first game when they defeated Binghamton 10-6.
Strangely, all of Hofstra’s games this season have come against other MAAC opponents. They have dropped games to Siena and Fairfield, while beating Manhattan and Quinnipiac.
The first draw of the game was a bad omen for the Red Foxes. They lost it, something they proceeded to do for nearly every draw the rest of the way, going 19-5 on the day.
“The draw is something, yeah, we need to kind of fix, and I think we’re working at trying to make sure that the ball’s going out to a lot of our pretty athletic players on the circle,” said Detelj.
With this disadvantage, Marist faced an uphill battle the entire game. Still, early on, they were able to hold on and stay in the game.
The first goal of the game came from Marist’s leading scorer, sophomore midfielder Amelia Pirozzi. Hofstra soon responded to tie it 1-1, where the score remained through the end of the first quarter.
A point of contention came early, as Hofstra’s second leading scorer, sophomore attacker Kayleigh Bender, scored what appeared to be a game-tying goal. Detelj, however, implored the officials to take another look, as he believed that Bender committed a foul before she scored. He was correct, and the officials took the goal off the board. Hofstra then proceeded to score the equalizing goal shorthanded.
Early in the second quarter, Hofstra’s star player began to dominate the game. Preseason all-CAA junior attacker Nikki Mannela scored a goal a minute and a half into the quarter to go up 2-1.
The Red Foxes responded in the quarter, as junior midfielder Anne Shine scored to tie the game. She continued her solid stretch of play, as she scored two goals in the last game against Vermont.
The highlight of the day for Marist came with six and a half minutes to go in the second. Freshman attacker Kathryn Staker dribbled back behind the Hofstra goal. She looked and passed over the goal, finding senior midfielder Caitlin McNaboe, who jumped and hit the ball with her stick, tapping it into the goal to go up 3-2.
This marked the last time that Marist held a lead in the game. Their mistakes began to catch up with them, as quickly after this goal, as a foul by the Marist goal by sophomore defender Taija Bell led to a Hofstra free position shot. While Manella took the shot and did not score, she did score off an assist after the shot.
Marist’s inability to control a draw came back to bite them quickly after this goal. The Pride won the next draw, and Manella drove down and found the net again, giving her a hat-trick in the first half, and putting her team up 4-2 at the end of the first half.
The third quarter was Marist’s sloppiest as the game began to slip away from them. A minute into the period, senior midfielder Amelia Angelo committed another foul by the Marist goal, leading to another Hofstra free position shot.
McNaboe scored again to cut it to a 5-4 deficit, until Manella scored again to go up by two with 10 minutes left in the quarter.
Hofstra continued to build on their lead, going up 8-4 by the end of the quarter.
Marist still had some fight left in the fourth after they allowed a few more goals to go down 11-6; Shine scored back-to-back goals to cut the deficit to three and give herself a hat-trick.
“She’s just been doing a great job finding good areas for her, and giving space to other players to make sure that she can be successful and so can her teammates,” said Detelj.
While Shine’s push gave them some momentum, it was ultimately not enough for the Red Foxes, as Manella added more goals in the quarter; she finished the game with six goals and one assist. Her play was the catalyst behind Hofstra’s win.
“We’ve shot ourselves in the foot quite a bit with some penalties and maybe some organizational stuff through the 4th quarter,” said Detelj.
The Red Foxes have a quick turnaround, as they host Columbia this Saturday at 5 p.m.
Edited by Max Rosen
Graphic by Quinn DiFiore
Photo by Jaylen Rizzo
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