PHILADELPHIA – It was a rainy afternoon at McCarthy Stadium for Alumni Appreciation Day, but the current team put on a show for past players. Women's lacrosse powered past VCU 12-6 for its second conference win of the season and fourth victory overall. Sophomore Allison Hunter led the Explorers with four goals and an assist, while classmate Molly Loughlin thwarted the Rams with 13 saves.

HOW IT HAPPENED

• Before five minutes had gone by, the conference rivals had traded goals, with Hunter opening the account for La Salle.
• Two goals from sophomore Maddie Dachowski and a strike from classmate Annina Iacobucci gave the Explorers a 4-1 advantage. VCU brought one back, sophomore Mikki Raymond restored the three-goal advantage, but the visitor's netted the final goal of the half to make it 5-3 La Salle.
• The Rams and Explorers parried back and forth to begin the second frame. The teams exchanged goals twice to push the score to 7-5 in favor of the home side.
• VCU added a goal at the 10:53 mark of the half to make it a one-score game, but that's as close as the Rams would get. La Salle netted five unanswered to run away with a 12-6 result.

INSIDE THE NUMBERS

• Undefeated: La Salle has never lost to VCU in program history. The win today pushes that unblemished record to 4-0.
• La Salle also won the battle at the draw as the Explorers tallied 15 draw controls to VCU's five. Senior Ashley Blanton heavily contributed to that number with a team-high six draw controls, followed by Hunter with four and fellow sophomore Bridget Ruskey with three.
• Along with scooping up a team-high seven ground balls, Loughlin won the battle in net. She finished with 13 saves on 19 shots for a season-high save percentage of 68.4%.
• Fire power: the Explorers outshot the Rams 32-23, with 26 of those shots coming on target. Hunter's line defined that efficiency: four shots, four goals.
• In addition to Hunter, four other Explorers ended up with multiple points. Iacoubucci was second with four points (three goals, one assist), while Dachowski (two goals), Ruskey (one goal, one assist) and Mikki Raymond (one goal, one assist) each had two points.

COACH'S THOUGHTS

• Head coach Katie Rhodes Abbott was impressed with the entire team's effort on Sunday: "Excellent team win today. Our draw unit came up huge for us and helped us gain more momentum offensively. Ashley Blanton, Bridget Ruskey and Isabel Caddick were work horses in the midfield for us and they did a lot of the gritty work that ended up making huge plays happen. Our goalie Molly Loughlin and the entire defensive unit were absolute rock stars— they held a very potent offense who averages double digit goals every game to just 6 goals today. We would not have been able to produce as well offensively without some of their key stops. Allison Hunter was awesome on the offensive end too- we really shared the ball and worked to set each other up and we saw a lot of success with it. Overall I'm really proud they were able to bounce back and get a big win today. They worked hard for it. We're looking forward to getting back to work Tuesday and preparing for two huge games next weekend.

UP NEXT

• Speaking of what's to come, La Salle travels to New York on Friday for a matchup with St. Bonaventure. The team will then return home for Senior Day on Sunday, April 7 against Richmond.