PREVIEW: Women's Soccer Begins Quest For 7th Championship on Sunday

NEWTON, Mass. -- The Lasell College women's soccer team enters the Great Northeast Athletic Conference (GNAC) playoffs as the top seed for the fourth consecutive season and will begin its quest for a seventh championship in as many years Sunday when the University of St. Joseph's visits Taylor Field for a quarterfinal match. Kickoff is set for 1:00 p.m.

The Lasers clinched the GNAC's top seed and hosting rights throughout the conference playoffs with a 5-2 win over St. Joseph's of Maine last Saturday. Lasell also triumphed in its final contest of the season Wednesday night, posting a 4-1 win at non-conference foe Framingham State.

The Blue Jays won just once in October and finished the regular season with a 6-10-1 record, including a 4-6-1 count in GNAC play. This marks USJ's 17th straight season in postseason play, although it is the No. 8 seed this year after three consecutive fifth-place finishes.

Lasell has rattled off 15 straight wins since opening the season with consecutive one-goal losses to No. 17 nationally-ranked Brandeis and Keene State and a tie against Johnson & Wales, its closest conference competitor.

Nine of those victories came in shutout fashion behind junior goalkeeper Sarah LaClair (Belchertown, Mass.), including five in a row from Sept. 17 to Oct. 1. LaClair has allowed just ten goals and needed to make just 60 saves all season while posting the second-best save percentage (.857) and goals-against average (.061) in the conference.

Lasell and USJ met once during the regular season, on Oct. 1, with LaClair making four saves in a 2-0 victory, establishing a new Lasell record with her 16th career shutout. The two teams also played in last season's GNAC semifinal — a scoreless contest through two overtimes before the Lasers advanced in eight rounds of penalty kicks.

Only one player in the GNAC has more points than Lasell senior Megan Cullen whose season-long total reached an even 40 this past week. The Amesbury, Mass., native has scored 11 goals in her last four games, including four each in nine-point efforts against Rivier and St. Joseph's of Maine on back-to-back Saturdays.

Cullen's 18 goals are twice more than any of her teammates as junior Carly Zdanek (Newton, N.J.) sits second on the Lasers with nine goals and 26 points.

Cullen and Zdanek combined for three of Lasell's four goals in Wednesday's regular-season finale, with Cullen — who was named GNAC Player of the Week for the second time this season on Monday — netting two of them. Nine other players have scored goals for Lasell this season, including sophomore Erica Badger (Scituate, Mass.) and junior Casey Meissner (Sandwich, Mass.) who have scored five apiece.

USJ has scored two goals or fewer in three of its six victories this season and enters Sunday's contest with just 1.29 goals on average this season, while allowing 1.80. Junior Jessica Spezzano (Watertown, Conn.) and sophomore Morgan Skoly (Vernon, Conn.) are the Blue Jays' leading scorers with five goals apiece. Spezzano has also added four assists for a team-leading 14 points.

JWU finished the season with a 9-0-2 record in conference play, just two points behind Lasell. The Wildcats will be the No. 2 seed and host seventh-seeded Suffolk in its opening postseason contest, while Albertus Magnus, St. Joseph's of Maine, Simmons, and Emmanuel are respectively seeded third through sixth, rounding out the playoff field.

All four quarterfinal contests are scheduled to be played Sunday, with the semifinals following on Wednesday, November 2 and the championship three days later.

During the game, the Laser Nation student fan club will be selling slices of Pizza from NY Pie for $1. All proceeds will go directly to the family of Peter Eyong, a near and dear Lasell staff member who lost his daughter to illness last week.

The quarterfinal  is set for Taylor Field at 1:00 p.m. The contest can be viewed live at https://portal.stretchinternet.com/lasell/.