Troy, NY-- The Sage Colleges' women's lacrosse team hosted the Blazers of Elms College on Wednesday night in a non-conference match-up. The contest was the season opener for the Gators and the Blazers tallied the 18-16 win. The victory puts Elms at 1-1 overall, while Sage drops to 0-1.
Sage's senior attacker Alexa Pajak (Earlton, NY/Academy of the Holy Names) started her second season at Sage just six points shy of becoming the program's all-time leading point scorer. She tallied 42 points as a junior and opened her final season with a 12-point performance on Wednesday night on seven goals and five assists. She surpassed the career record set by Ginelle Butler (2009-2012 with 47 points). Pajak also broke the career goal scoring record set last season by Butler with 40 as she now has 44. Another mark she also shattered in the action was the Sage career assists record as she also surpassed Butler's seven assists and now has 10 on her career.
A year ago, Pajak racked up a Sage single-game record as she had 14 points in the team's win over Elms on 12 goals and two assists. On Wednesday, she just missed tying her 2012 effort as she had 12 points in the Gators' loss.
Elm's freshman Ashley Cava (Wilbraham, MA/Minnechaug Regional) finished with five goals and an assist to lead the Blazers as they held an 8-7 halftime lead. Senior Chelsea Grabowski (South Hadley, MA/South Hadley) and sophomore Nora McDonough (South Hadley, MA/South Hadley) each netted four goals apiece for Elms as all four of McDonough's goals came in the second half. Grabowski broke a 14-14 tie with her goal at 9:26 followed by a pair of goals from McDonough at 7:39 and 6:01 to keep Elms ahead down the stretch.
For the Gators, freshman midfielder Mallory Hansen (Johnstown, NY/Johnstown) connected for four goals in her collegiate debut, while junior Alayna Kaiser (Ballston Lake, NY/Shenendehowa) added four points on three goals and an assists.
For Elms, sophomore goalie Alysha Parsons (Newington, CT/Newington) picked up the win after making eight saves on the night and is now 1-1 in goal. In goal for the Gators, senior Courtney Reed (Mechanicville, NY/Mechanicville) suffered the loss to drop to 0-1 on the year. She started the season also owning the program's career saves mark (214) and added to it on Wednesday night as she racked up 15 and now has 229 career saves.
The Gators return to action on March 13 travelling to Utica College for a 4 p.m. non-conference game, while Elms is back in action on March 14 for a non-conference game at the College of St. Elizabeth's at 3 p.m.
