Box Score DANBURY, Conn. – The Manhattanville women's lacrosse team put together an exciting late-game rally to make the game close, but an 11-goal second-half deficit was simply too much to overcome as the Valiants fell to Western Connecticut State by a 20-16 score in non-conference action on a chilly Tuesday night at the Westside Athletic Complex.
 
Junior Casandra Honovich (Cortlandt Manor, N.Y./Walter Panas) and senior Melissa Goncalves (Holtsville, N.Y./Sachem East) led the charge for Manhattanville with six points apiece on four goals and two assists each. Senior Maggie Howley (Philadelphia, Pa./Cardinal Dougherty) chipped in three goals and sophomore Mallory Bakst (Morganville, N.J./Marlboro) added two goals and an assist as well.
 
Lindsay Gorman had a game-high six goals and seven points to pace the Colonials, while Nicole Perrone added four goals and Emily Brooks chipped in three goals and an assist.
 
Western Connecticut State started the game strongly, controlling the first four draws of the contest and converting them into goals before Goncalves got the visitors on the board 6:35 into the game to make it 4-1.
 
A goal by Gorman made it 5-1 WCSU, but Honovich came back with her first of the game from the eight-meter line, and then controlled the subsequent draw and marched down the field to score again just 19 seconds later. The Valiants continued to push after Honovich's second, as both she and Howley fired shots off the post, but the momentum was halted by an Emma Theiler tally that started a stretch of four WCSU goals in a span of 4:20 that made it a 9-3 game with 13:34 to go in the half.
 
Manhattanville came back with three goals in a row off the crosses of Honovich, Bakst and Goncalves to get back within three; however, WestConn again rattled off four straight goals to end the frame, giving the home team a 13-6 lead at the break. The Colonials' run was increased to eight straight goals by scoring the first four of the second half, putting the Valiants in a 17-6 hole with 22:56 remaining in the contest.
 
But as they have proven capable of doing in many games this year, Manhattanville continued to fight throughout the contest. The Valiants actually dominated play for much of the final 20 minutes, scoring 10 of the game's final 13 goals, but the margin was too much to overcome.
 
Four Valiants combined to score one tally each to make it an 18-10 game with 14:31 left. Junior Brooke Marcimo (Shrewsbury, Mass./Shrewsbury) started the mini 4-1 run with a free-position score, and the squad also got eight-meter strikes from Howley and Bakst and an unassisted tally from Goncalves. Gorman and sophomore Meghann Haggerty (Centerport, N.Y./Harborfields) then traded goals to keep it an eight-goal deficit as the clock fell beneath 10 minutes to play.
 
Manhattanville scored five more times in the final 6:38, including two from Howley and one each from Goncalves, Honovich and Marcimo, but in the end the team fell too far behind to make up all the ground.
 
The Valiants outshot Western Connecticut by an 18-4 margin over the final 19 minutes and 20-15 in the second half, but still finished on the wrong side of a 42-34 shot disparity. Manhattanville also converted seven free-position attempts on the night, the most by the team since an April 21, 2011 win over Arcadia and tied for the most by a Valiant side since at least 2006.
 
Freshman Caitlin Sosa (New York, N.Y./Monroe-Woodbury) allowed seven goals on 10 shots in the second half to suffer the loss, while sophomore Kirsten Shaughnessy (Le Center, Minn./LeSueur-Henderson St. Peter) allowed 13 goals on 17 shots over the first 30 minutes.  
 
Manhattanville (1-9) will finally open Freedom Conference play with its next contest, but the team will have to wait over a week to do it as the Valiants are scheduled to host Eastern on April 10 at GoValiants.com Field. Game time is set for 4 p.m., with the live GoValiants.TV broadcast scheduled to begin at 3:55 p.m.