Virginia Women's Lacrosse Wins at Richmond 14-9

Virginia women's lacrosse (4-2) picked up its second road win in a row, outlasting Richmond (2-4) to come away with a 14-9 victory on Wednesday night at Robbins Stadium in Richmond.

In five of Virginia's six games this season, the Cavaliers have scored the first three goals of the game. UVA actually scored the first four goals of the game at Richmond, with each goal coming from a different scorer. The Spiders were scoreless for the first 10 minutes of the game, but then scored three times to end the opening period, including a goal from Grace Muldoon with just five seconds to go to make it 4-3 at the end of the first quarter.

Virginia answered with another 3-0 scoring run, sparked by a goal from Madison Alaimo, who had two goals and three assists in the first half alone. Richmond score the next two goals, but the Cavaliers closed the half on a 3-0 run with Payton Sfreddo, Jenna Dinardo and Alex Reilly finding the back of the net to make it 10-5 in favor of the Cavaliers at the half.

Draw controls were 11-6 in favor of UVA in the first half and the Cavaliers outshot the Spiders 22-11 by halftime, but six saves from Richmond goalie Abby Francioli prevented this game from becoming a complete blowout in the first half.

In the third quarter, Richmond succeeded in slowing down the game and denying possessions to Virginia. The Spiders won three of the four draw controls, won the ground ball battle 5-4, but committed five costly turnovers. Still Richmond scored twice to make it 10-7 and held Virginia off the scoreboard until Kate Miller found the back of the net late in the third quarter to push the UVA lead back to 11-7 heading to the fourth quarter.

Richmond put some real pressure on Virginia early in the fourth as Juliana Stanley and Alexis Morton scored to make it 11-9 with 11 minutes to go. Virginia was kept out of the net until Abby Manalang scored with 5:39 remaining. Madison Alaimo scored her third goal just 41 seconds later and then Miller scored less than a minute after that, capping a 3-0 burst that served as the nail in the coffin, sealing Virginia's 14-9 victory.

Madison Alaimo led the way for the Cavaliers with six points on three goals and three assists and Jenna Dinardo had three goals as well. Kate Miller, Abby Manalang, and Alex Reilly had two goals apiece. Mel Josephson bounced back from a few tough performances with a solid outing, saving eight shots versus nine goals allowed.

Up next, Virginia plays its third consecutive road game and its biggest challenge of the season to date at No. 2 North Carolina on Saturday afternoon. Opening draw is set for 2:30pm ET at Dorrance Field in Chapel Hill and the game will be streamed on ACC Network Extra.

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