The Georgetown women’s lacrosse team (6-4, Big East) will face the Butler Bulldogs (3-7, Big East) in the Big East opener on Saturday in Indianapolis, IN. Opening draw is scheduled for 12:00 p.m. ET. The Hoyas beat UC Davis (6-6, MPSF) this Sunday 20-11 after a three-game losing streak to ranked rivals.
The Hoyas look to start Big East play on the right foot and recover from their previous losses. In their last game, senior midfielder Francesca Whitehurst had a stellar performance, scoring five goals and adding one assist, while senior attacker Taylor Gebhardt contributed another three goals. Georgetown was superior from beginning to end, never letting the Aggies get closer than three goals after the initial 4-1 start. It is worth mentioning that the Hoyas had 52 shots, 39 of those on goal, while UC Davis only managed only 24 shots, 18 on goal. The defense was the foundation of the Hoyas win, and they will look to follow up during the conference opener.
The Bulldogs fell to the Vanderbilt Commodores (8-2, 1-0 AAC) 19-2, in a great overall performance by the winners. The Bulldogs were never able to get into the game after an 11-0 initial stretch by Vanderbilt. Sophomore attacker Ashley Guerra represents the biggest threat, having recorded 22 goals and 15 assists so far this season, followed by sophomore attacker Karina Latsko with 15 goals and five assists.
Butler has been struggling this season, and the Hoyas are the favorites going into this one. However, this game marks the start to conference play, and anything can happen here.
“It’s just a wake up call to them that we can’t drift through games, we need to make sure we come out with a higher sense of urgency from the beginning,” Georgetown head coach Ricky Fried said after the win over Davis.
“I feel really good about what we are capable of doing, the big question for us is whether we are going to be disciplined enough to do it on a regular basis, so the consistency factor is going to be the area of focus for us over the next week,” Fried added when asked about conference play. “The two big areas of improvement are going to be shooting and defense, making sure we are forcing things the right way and not letting them flip the field on us.”
The match is scheduled to start at 12:00 p.m. ET on Saturday. Live stats will be available at guhoyas.com. Follow @GUVoiceSports on Twitter for live updates and breaking news.
