Anne Risler adds Gator of the Year honors for her play with women's lacrosse team

Anne Risler awarded Gator of the Year in women's lacrosse by head coach Lauren Marois.
Anne Risler awarded Gator of the Year in women's lacrosse by head coach Lauren Marois.

Albany, NY — The Sage Colleges recently honored several student-athletes in conjunction with their annual athletic award banquet. Among the many awards handed out, Sage selected junior women's lacrosse player Anne Risler (Albany, NY/Academy of the Holy Names). In addition, Risler was also inducted into Sage's Athletic Honor Society for her outstanding performance in the classroom.

On the 2019 season, she finished as the Gator high scorer with 34 points on 32 goals with two assists, despite missing a handful of games with illness.  Risler ranks in a tie for the fifth spot on Sage's career points list with 68 points, while also standing fifth in career goals with 59.

Head women's lacrosse coach Lauren Marois said of Risler, "Our Gator of the Year award winner for women's lacrosse has helped the team all over the field as well as off the field." Marois continued, "She helped our team by learning a new position when it was needed. She has been a huge part in our transition game as well as on draw controls and on the offensive end of the field for us. Anne has continued to play with passion and heart and has been a leader of the field when we needed one too!"

Among the many accomplishments the 2019 team had was an impressive 19-8 win at Alfred University this year.  Risler led the team with 10 goals and became the third player in program history to score 10 or more goals in a game, and the first since Monica Koralus had 10 at home in a game vs. Elms in 2017. Alexa Veeder holds the record with 12 at Elms in 2012. Risler had 16 shots, which is tied with three other players for the fourth most in program history and added six draw controls in the match.  This game marked the sixth time the Gators scored a total of 19 goals in a game, and the first since the 2017 game vs. Elms. The record is 21 and Sage has two games with 20 goals each since the program began in 2009. This game also produced the most goals in an Empire 8 game for the Gators.