TAMPA, Fla. – The No. 6 Florida Southern College Moccasins defeated the No. 10 Flagler College Saints 19-15 in a physical matchup at the Naimoli Family Athletic Complex at the University of Tampa in the NCAA First Round.
With the win, the Mocs move to 17-3 on the year as the Saints fall to 17-2. The win also sets up the third meeting of the year between No. 2 the University of Tampa and Florida Southern, all at Tampa on May 14 at 12:00 p.m.
In the win,
Jackie Stoller notched her 100
th career point at Florida Southern finishing the game with five points, four goals and one assist, where she sits at 101 this season.
Madison Tare paced the Mocs in overall points with six off one goal and five assists.
Lizzy Lynch,
Hailey Daleo, and
Giana Murphy were all busy as well where Lynch was credited with two goals and three assists while Daleo had five goals on the day. Murphy too tallied five points thanks to a four-goal-one assist game.
Rylie Rittberg earned her ninth win of the year coming in relief and playing the final 33:29 while making 12 stops in goal, setting a new career-high.
Florida Southern started the game off winning the opening draw control thanks to
Madison Tare before the Moccasins found themselves up 1-0 thanks to the connection of
Lizzy Lynch and
Hailey Daleo. Flagler answered with three straight goals for a 3-1 lead.
The Moccasins answered back with three of their own from
Tare,
Jackie Stoller, and
Lynch to make it 4-3 FSC. The Saints notched one just a minute later to tie it at 4-4 before 6:20 ran off the clock where it felt like the two teams were heading to the second period all knotted up. The Saints would sneak one more in with 26-ticks left for the 5-4 first-quarter advantage.
The second quarter started off just like the first, all momentum to the Mocs as Florida Southern rattled off three straight for the 7-5 lead. In the run,
Stoller and
Daleo found the back of the net again while
Giana Murphy notched her first goal of the game.
The Saints came marching again to score two straight to tie things up again, at 7, before outscoring the Mocs 2-1 to head into the halftime break up 9-8.
Florida Southern came into the third quarter fired up and used a 5-2 advantage to take a 13-11 lead to the six-minute mark with
Stoller scoring twice,
Sammy Gorrasi,
Daleo, and
Hailey O'Donoghue who cleared the ball and made two major cuts to go 1-on-1 with the keeper for her long goal.
Emma Dudley tacked on the Mocs' sixth goal of the frame to push it to 14-11 before a goal with just 40-seconds by the Saints cut it to 14-12 heading to the final quarter of regulation.
Another big quarter for Florida Southern started out with a Saints goal for it to be 14-13 before back-to-back
Murphy goals allowed the Mocs to sit ahead 16-13. She scored her first goal in the run on a give-and-go with
Lynch before finding the back of the net off a few cuts.
Flagler would get one goal back, 16-14, before
Daleo,
Lynch, and
Murphy scored in succession to put the game at 19-14 with just three minutes to play. The Saints would get one back with 14-seconds left, as the final horn sounded.
Down the stretch, and after the Moccasins' IWLCA All-South Region and First Team All-SSC defender
Gina Verrone was sent to the bench with 13:56 to play in the third, Florida Southern outscored Flagler 10-6 to close the game.
