March 27, 1998

Women's Lacrosse Defeats Davidson

Courtney Calabrese's scores five goals

NOTRE DAME, Ind. --- The Notre Dame women's lacrosse team, in just its second year as a varsity sport, produced the biggest win in the program's history as the Irish registered an 18-11 victory at Davidson on Friday night. The victory avenges last season's 21-8 loss to the Wildcats in Notre Dame's first varsity season and improves the Irish record to 5-2 in 1998.

The Irish were led by two freshmen, Courtney Calabrese and Lael O'Shaughnessy. Calabrese scored five goals and dished off an assist while O'Shaughnessy netted four goals and had an assist. Junior co-captain Kerry Callahan had three goals and a team-high three assists.

Notre Dame led 13-4 at halftime. Mara Grace, who finished with two goals and an assist, scored the game's first goal 45 seconds into the contest. Davidson went ahead 2-1 with 25:11 remaining in the first half, before the Irish responded with nine unanswered goal, including two by both Calabrese and O'Shaughnessy with 8:21 remaining until intermission. Davidson broke its scoring drought at the 7:45 mark, but Notre Dame put three more goals on the board before halftime. Two of the final three goals scored right before the end of the first half were put in by Calabrese, while the other Irish goal was credited to O'Shaughessy.

Davidson scored the first four goal of the second half to cut the Notre Dame deficit to 13-8 with 23:11 remaining in the contest. The Irish, however, responded with three goals over 2:23 to build a 16-8 advantage.

Freshman Carrie Marshall played the entire game and finished with a career best 12 saves in the game.

With the loss, Davidson falls to 2-3 on the season.

Notre Dame returns to action on Sunday, March 29 at Duke when the Irish face the fifth-ranked Blue Devils at 1:00 p.m. It will mark the first time in the program's history that Notre Dame has faced a ranked opponent.