PIKESVILLE, Ohio - Fresh off of clinching their third consecutive GLIAC regular season title, No. 17 Grand Valley State cruised to their 10th consecutive win in a 21-5 victory over Lake Erie to conclude the regular season with a perfect in-conference record for the third year in a row.
Erika Neumen and
Victoria Devine both notched four goals and two assists to lead the Lakers (13-4, 7-0 GLIAC) to victory on the evening.
Rachel Leibovitz added four goals to her stat line and was a perfect 3-3 in free-position attempts.
Ryan Skomial earned herself a hat-trick in the win, while
Brooke Ingraham,
Sarah Lowe and
Molly McGeeney all dished out two assists.
Zoe Stiemann pulled down five draw controls, good to lead both teams in the category, while Ingraham, Lowe,
Caitlin Wojichowski and
Carolyn Kraus all picked up two ground balls apiece. Wojichowski led the charge on defense with four caused turnovers, and
Sarah Zwilsky made five saves against 14 shots faced for her 13th win of the season, tying her with Audrey Kobe for the single-season record.
Back-to-back free-position goals by Leibovitz opened the game for GVSU before Lake Erie (7-7, 4-3 GLIAC) put their first goal in the back of the net. A four-goal run for the Lakers with tallies by Skomial, Kraus, Neumen and
Kira Dosenberry in the span of nearly six minutes to put GVSU up big early in the contest. The second Storm goal of the half did little to stop the flood of Laker goals as two-straight goals by Leibovitz kicked off a run of five goals to push the score to 11-2. Back-to-back goals by the Storm made it a seven-point game, but
Erika Neumen ripped a pair of goals in the final 32 seconds of the half off passes by
Ashley Bailey and Devine to give the Lakers a nine-goal advantage going into the break. The fourth goal by Lake Erie with 45 seconds left on the clock would be their last goal until 7:12 of the second half.
Grand Valley State resumed the scoring in the second half as Dosenberry found the back of the net at 28:46 to start a run of eight unanswered goals to put the lead out of reach for the Storm. Two of Devine's four goals came during the run, as did scores by Neumen, Skomial, Kraus and
Jordan Luberto, and Grand Valley State had eclipsed 20 goals in a game for the third time this season, giving them their 13th win of the year to tie the school record for wins in a season.
Taylor Mathis led Lake Erie with three points on two goals and an assist, while Taylor Izzo added two goals and Kayla Bohn put one in the net. Katie Holden made eight saves in the loss in all 60 minutes of action for the Storm.
Grand Valley State now awaits their next opponent as the 2015 GLIAC Tournament kicks off with the Quarterfinals on Tuesday, April 28 at the site of the higher seeded team. As the top seed and host of the final two rounds, Grand Valley State will receive a bye to the Semifinals and will face the winner of fourth-seeded Lake Erie and fifth-seeded McKendree (10-5, 3-4 GLIAC). Second-seeded Tiffin (10-7, 6-1 GLIAC) will face either third-seeded Findlay (7-8, 5-2 GLIAC) and sixth-seeded Ursuline (4-11, 2-5 GLIAC).