Northwestern University Athletics
Wildcats Hope to Make Dartmouth Green Friday
5/18/2005 12:00:00 AM | Women's Lacrosse
May 18, 2005
NU-Dartmouth Game Notes in PDF Format
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EVANSTON, Ill. - On February 28, 2004, Lindsey Munday scored a goal in the final minute of Northwestern's game at Rutgers, allowing the Wildcats to pull out a 14-13 win. That game was NU's 34th since it returned to varsity status for the 2002 season, and it put the program's record to that point at a pedestrian 15-19.
Northwestern has played 34 games since then, and gone 32-2.
(1) Northwestern vs. (4) Dartmouth
NCAA Championship Semifinal
Friday, May 20 * 6 p.m. Eastern (5 p.m. Central)
Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium (Annapolis, Md.)
Radio: WNUR (89.3 FM) -- Guy Benson and Frank Tormey, announcers
TV: None
Click here for more Championship information!
To say the Wildcats' ascension among the lacrosse elite has been swift would be an understatement. In a year when the booming popularity of the sport has moved into the national consciousness (thanks, CSTV, Sports Illustrated, and ESPNU), Northwestern is carrying the torch for the women's game off the East coast and into the Midwest.
It has been a heady ride for the Wildcat women, but primarily for the 10 "originals" -- the women who were part of head coach Kelly Amonte Hiller's first recruiting class and the first to take the chance and buy into the dream she was selling about a moribund program that was getting ready to put its roots back into the varsity ranks. From Day One, those women told anyone who would listen that their goal was to win a national title before they left, and this weekend they stand on the cusp of accomplishing what they set out to do. They are Sarah Albrecht, Shelby Chlopak, Sara Crosby, Kate Darmody, Courtney Flynn, Ashley Gersuk, Kaitie Lenahan, Donna McCann, Meredith Philipp, and Sarah Walsh.
Of course, other women have established their own stories as the years have gone by. Ashley and Courtney Koester joined the program after fallball in 2001 -- recruited by Amonte Hiller after she saw them playing intramural sports -- and have become the cornerstones of a Wildcat defense that leads the nation in goals-against average.
At the other end, Kristen Kjellman, Aly Josephs and Munday spearhead an offense that leads the country in scoring. Kjellman -- one of Amonte Hiller's many recruits from her home state of Massachusetts -- is ALC Player of the Year as a sophomore; Munday joins her on the Tewaaraton Trophy final list and leads the nation in scoring.
The result is a 19-0 record, the No. 1 ranking in the nation for nine weeks now, and a first-ever venture to the semifinal round of the NCAA Championship.
Northwestern vs. Dartmouth
This is the first meeting between the Wildcats and the Big Green in the modern era of NU lacrosse (since 2002).
