NCAA women's lacrosse roundup: Tech, U.Va. win; UR falls

“It doesn’t really feel real yet,” said Virginia Tech senior Tristan McGinley, who scored four goals. “Our biggest thing was, ‘We don’t want to just come here. We want to come here and we want to win games.’ So we woke up with that mind-set this morning.

“We executed, and we couldn’t be happier.”

The 13th-ranked Hokies (14-6) led the 21st-ranked Hoyas the entire second half.

Virginia Tech had been 0-4 all-time against former Big East rival Georgetown (12-7), although the teams were meeting for the first time since 2004.

The Hokies will face second-seeded and third-ranked North Carolina (15-3), which had a first-round bye, in the Sweet 16 at 1 p.m. Sunday at Cardinal Gibbons High School. UNC could not host the Friday and Sunday games because its lacrosse stadium is being renovated and its football stadium was booked for commencement.

The NCAA tournament win was just the latest accomplishment in a historic season for the Hokies.

The Hokies had already broken the school records for overall and ACC victories. They beat Notre Dame and Syracuse for the first time, in addition to winning an ACC tournament game for the first time and receiving their first NCAA bid.

Virginia Tech will have to make some more history if it is to advance to the quarterfinals, however.

The Hokies are 0-26 all-time against the Tar Heels.

“To beat Carolina for the first time, no better place to do it,” Tech coach John Sung said. “This would be just a great way to keep the season going.”

In this year’s regular-season meeting at UNC, the Hokies led 12-11 with two minutes left but lost 13-12. The Tar Heels beat Tech 14-8 in the ACC semifinals at Duke.

“There’s not too many surprises with them, just because we have played them so many times,” McGinley said.

The rusty Hokies, who had been idle since that April 27 loss in the ACC semifinals, fell behind 2-0 in the first four minutes of Friday’s game.

“We haven’t played against a team in awhile, … so it took us a little bit to jump into the game,” said Tech freshman Paige Petty, who scored four goals.

Sung did not start McGinley and senior defender Brittany VanVeldhuisen for undisclosed disciplinary reasons. Both players came off the bench in the first half.

The Hokies scored five straight goals to grab a 5-2 lead with 12:11 left in the first half. They led the rest of the way. Petty scored three goals in the run, with McGinley and Emma Crooks scoring the other two.

McGinley scored all four of her goals in the first half to help the Hokies build a 9-3 halftime lead.

The Hoyas, playing in the NCAAs for the first time since 2014, had 10 turnovers in the first half.

“We had too many turnovers in the first half,” Hoyas coach Ricky Fried said. “The first half, we kind of showed that we haven’t been here in awhile.”

The temperature was in the 80s, and it did not help that the game was played on artificial turf. The heat got to Tech goalie Meagh Graham, who was unable to start the second half.

Backup goalie Morgan Berman played the first 4:22 of the second half. Graham returned with Tech up 10-4.

Trailing 11-4, the Hoyas scored four straight goals to cut the deficit to 11-8 with 14:14 to go.

“We just got tired,” Sung said. “We haven’t played in a temperature like this this year.”

Petty and Marissa Davey scored to extend the lead to 13-8 with 8:36 left.

Graham finished with 10 saves.

U.Va. 12, Stanford 3: Sammy Mueller scored five goals and Kasey Behr added four more as the Cavaliers rolled to an easy win over the 10th-seeded Cardinal in Harrisonburg.

Maggie Jackson added a goal and four assists, and Daniela Kelly and Chloe Jones each scored a goal in the victory.

Rachel Vander Kolk made 14 saves and recorded an .824 save percentage for the Cavaliers (10-9), who face James Madison in the second round on Sunday.

Dillon Schoen, Taylor Scornavacco and Emma Knaus scored for the Cardinal, the Pac-12 tournament champions who ended their season at 15-5.

Northwestern 24, Richmond 18: Selena Lasota scored nine goals and added two assists as the Wildcats’ offense proved too potent for the Spiders in Towson, Md.

Katie Sciandra paced Richmond, the Atlantic 10 tournament champions, with seven goals.

Marissa Brown added four goals, Mia Castagnero and Kim Egizi had three each and Madison Ostrick added one.

Sheila Nesselbush added six goals for Northwestern (14-5), who moved on to face Towson on Sunday. Megan Kinna, Danita Stroup and Claire Quinn added two goals apiece, and Nicole Beardsley, Shelby Fredericks and Linsey McKone tallied one each.