Behind a trio of three-goal performances, the No. 4 Florida lacrosse team took care of a visiting Dartmouth team 16-6 Saturday to capture the 100th win in the program’s seven-year history.
It took Gators’ coach Amanda O’Leary, who has been with the team since its inaugural season, just 127 games to reach the milestone, extending her career coaching record to 262-92.
In that span, she has led Florida to a Final Four appearance, two American Lacrosse Conference Tournament titles and one Big East Tournament championship.
Junior midfielder Mollie Stevens continued her impressive season against the Big Green (2-1), scoring three times to extend her season goal count to 14. Coming into the Saturday’s match, she was tied for 12th in the country in goals.
Stevens, who was named alongside UF defender Caroline Fitzgerald to the 2016 Tewaaraton Watch List on Thursday, extended her school record of consecutive games with a goal to 29 dating back to last season.
Redshirt senior midfielder Nicole Graziano and junior attacker Sammi Burgess each scored three goals for Florida (4-0).
The remaining seven goals were split between eight different Gators. Four of those scorers, Carli Marsh, Fitzgerald, Allie Pavinelli and Sam Darcangelo, netted their first goals of the 2016 campaign.
“They don’t know what to expect,” Burgess said about the scoring distribution. “A lot of us shoot differently, a lot of us have different strengths. … We can’t be scouted that much because nobody knows where it’s going to come from.”
The defensive effort from the Gators was one that O’Leary was very pleased with, especially the amount of turnovers that Florida caused.
Florida’s four starting defenders — Fitzgerald, Sydney DuPre, Taylor Bresnahan and Aniya Flanagan — caused a total of four turnovers, ones that O’Leary deemed as “momentum changers.”
Bresnahan’s lone forced turnover of the game led to a possession ending in Marsh’s goal to give UF a 6-2 lead.
The victory came in the wake of last week’s upset win over then-No. 2 North Carolina. Despite the statement that accompanied the result, the Gators did not come into Saturday’s game with a huge victory from the previous week in mind.
The focus was all on the Big Green.
“We definitely were really excited that day,” Graziano said of the UNC win. “And then Sunday and Monday a new train of thought: Dartmouth.”
The Gators improved to 4-0 for the the second time in school history and will shift the focus to Tuesday’s matchup against No. 2 Syracuse on the road.
A video posted to Floridagators.com contributed to this report.
Contact Kyle Brutman at kbrutman@alligator.org and follow him on Twitter @KBrut13.
UF's Mollie Stevens attempts to make a play on the ball during Florida's 12-11 win over Michigan on Feb. 13, 2016, at Donald R. Dizney Stadium.
