Utica, NY- The Utica College women's lacrosse team begins Empire 8 Conference Tournament play for a third straight season on Tuesday. The third-seeded Pioneers will host sixth-seeded Keuka on the turf at Charles A. Gaetano Stadium on Tuesday, April 27th. Opening draw is set for 7 p.m.
Live Coverage: Live video and stats of the game will be made available at https://portal.stretchinternet.com/utica/. Additionally, the game can be seen on the free Empire 8 apps available on Roku, Amazon Fire, and AppleTV devices.
Last Time Out: Last weekend, the Pioneers continued to showcase their explosive offense in a 23-4 win against Elmira College. 13 different players were able to find the back of the net. Junior attacker Lexi Scaccia (Whitesboro, NY/Whitesboro) and sophomore attacker Samantha DeCondo (Whitesboro, NY/Whitesboro) led the Pioneers with four goals apiece.
Freshman Frenzy: In last weekend's game against Elmira, six different rookies scored a goal. Midfielder Devin Ryan (Orchard Park, NY/Buffalo Academy of the Sacred Heart) led the freshman class with three goals on the night to bring her career total to eight. Midfielder Kaitie Crofoot had one goal over the weekend to stand at seven goals in her rookie season. Attacker Alyssa Drell (Mastic, NY/William Floyd) added one and holds the most goals amongst the freshman class with 16 this season. Midfielder Carly Fine (Bayside, NY/Bayside) scored her third career goal, attacker Tracy Moreno (Cedar Grove, NJ/Cedar Grove) potted her seventh, and midfielder Delaney Turtura (Cleveland, NY/Paul V. Moore) scored her first career goal against Elmira.
Back Again: UC will be making a third consecutive E8 tournament appearance this season. UC appeared in the 2018 and 2019 tournaments, and fell in the semifinal round both times. The 2020 tournament did not take place.
Stat Leaders: The Pioneers have a number of players occupying high spots on the conference and national leaderboards. Lexi Scaccia (Whitesboro, NY/Whitesboro) holds third in the league in points per game with an average of 4.15. Scaccia also holds 4th in goals per game, averaging 2.85 per contest. She has a conference-leading 54 points on 37 goals and seventeen assists. She is also 55th in the nation in free position shooting percentage at 68.8 percent. Samantha DeCondo (Whitesboro, NY/Whitesboro) is second in the conference with 36 goals, a figure which ranks 77th in the nation. She is ninth in the conference with 3.23 points per game. The Pioneer quartet of Stephanie Husnay (Whitesboro, NY/Whitesboro), Scaccia, Lauren Wolff (Peabody, MA/Peabody), and Katherine Migliori (Rome, NY/Rome Free Academy) are all in the top 200 nationally in assists this season. Husnay is third in the conference with nineteen assists. In goal, Claire Frier (Lafayette, NY/Lafayette) has made a conference-leading 77 saves, a figure which ranks 73rd in the country.
On Offense: Utica leads the conference and is 55th in the nation in scoring offense at an average of 15.23 goals per game. They have scored 20 or more goals in four of their last five appearances. The Pioneers are 48th in the country in scoring margin, and have outscored opponents by an average of 6.77 goals per game.
On Defense: The Pioneers lead the conference and are 29th nationally in caused turnovers with an average of 12.31 per game. Lexi Scaccia (Whitesboro, NY/Whitesboro) is ninth among the individual leaders in that category. Of 254 teams nationally, Utica ranks 50th in scoring defense in Division III with an average of 8.46 goals against per game.
History With Keuka: The Pioneers and Wolves have a short history together, with just seven games between them. Utica leads the series by a 6-1 margin. Earlier this year, the Pioneers travelled to Keuka and came away with a 22-2 win. Utica has lost to Keuka just once, with that happening in 2014 by an 11-10 score.
About Keuka: The Wolves have had a challenging season with a 1-4 record entering the tournament. In their last game of the regular season, Keuka came out on the winning end of an offensive shootout as they defeated Sage, 23-17.
Tourney Tracker: The 2021 Empire 8 Women's Lacrosse Championship will be a six-team, single elimination tournament. In Tuesday's opening round, sixth-seeded Keuka will play third-seeded Utica, while fourth-seeded Hartwick hosts fifth-seeded Sage. In the semifinals, top-seeded St. John Fisher will get the Hartwick/Sage winner, while second-seeded Nazareth will get the Utica/Keuka winner. Those games will be played on Friday, April 30th. The championship game will be held at the highest remaining seed on Sunday, May 2nd.
