Pirates Fall In Overtime At Old Dominion

Sunday, March 21

Norfolk, Va.

1:00 P.M.

East Carolina University

3-5, 1-1American

Old Dominion

3-6, 1-1American

East Carolina

Old Dominion

Photo by: Rob Goldberg

March 21, 2021 | Lacrosse

Box Score Box Score

NORFOLK, VA. – A goal in overtime cost the East Carolina lacrosse team as the Pirates fell to Old Dominion 13-12 on Sunday afternoon.

After getting out to a quick start on Friday against Old Dominion, it was East Carolina who fell behind on Sunday. The Monarchs scored the game's first three goals and four of the first five to take a 4-1 lead.

The two teams traded goals after that start, with Megan Pallozzi scoring for ECU, and Old Dominion maintained a 5-2 lead halfway through the first half. From there though, the ECU offense began to come alive. Nicole LeGar scored on a man-advantage situation, her second goal of the game. That gave LeGar 100 points in her ECU career, the first Pirate to reach the century mark.

Following LeGar's goal, Camryn Pennypacker got a goal of her own with Payton Barr adding a three straight ECU tally to tie the game at 5-5. The Pirates took their first lead of the day as Liz Wilson extended the run with her first goal, but Old Dominion regained the lead with two quick tallies.

East Carolina finished the half with a flurry of goals. Megan Tryniski scored back-to-back goals for the Pirates while Frances Kimel scored with just 29 seconds remaining in the half to give ECU a 9-6 lead at the break.

ECU got the first goal of the second half, with Wilson scoring off a feed from Kimel, but that was the only Pirate goal for the first 13 minutes of the second half. At the other end, Old Dominion scored three goals in two and a half minutes to tie the game at 10-10 with 21:25 remaining.

The game was tied for nearly five minutes, with both teams having chances to take the lead. Ashley Vernon was called upon to make a pair of saves to keep the game level. Finally, ECU broke the deadlock when Ally Stanton scored from a free-position shot. But that lead lasted less than two minutes before Old Dominion's Haley O'Connor scored on a free-position shot of her own.

The Monarchs took the lead with 11:04 remaining and it looked like that goal might stand as the winner as the clock clicked toward zero. But ECU took advantage of another man-up opportunity with just 2:07 left in the game. This time it was Pallozzi setting up LeGar, with LeGar completing her hat trick for the second straight game.

The two teams went to overtime and Old Dominion nearly won the game in the first 90 seconds of extra time. Lindsay Baer took a shot, but Vernon made the save to keep the score level. Unfortunately for ECU, the next Old Dominion shot was the game-winner, as Tess Meurling scored with 2:02 left in the first overtime to clinch the victory.

Old Dominion finished with a 31-25 edge in shots, including 8-4 in free-position shots. The Monarchs also held a large advantage in the draw circle, leading 19-9 in draw controls.

Kimel, LeGar and Tryniski all led the Pirates with three points each. Kimel also led ECU with four draw controls while LeGar, Liz Blumthal and Alexandra Giacolone each forced two Old Dominion turnovers. Vernon finished with 10 saves for the Pirates.

The Pirates will be back home on Friday afternoon when they play host to Vanderbilt. That contest is slated for a 4 p.m., start in Johnson Stadium and will be broadcast on ESPN+.