Preview: Bentley Set for NCAA Tournament Debut Friday Vs. Mercy
Waltham, Mass. – Five days after winning the Northeast-10 Championship for the first time, Bentley University will compete in the NCAA Division II Women's Lacrosse Championship for the first time. The Falcons will take on Mercy College on Friday at noon in Rochester, New York.
The game can be seen live at the following link: https://eccsportsnetwork.com/robertswesleyan/
Bentley, with a 12-2 record, was selected as the No. 3 seed in the East Region after they won the NE10 title on Sunday with a 9-8 victory over Adelphi. Mercy, also 12-2 on the season, is the No. 2 seed in the East Region.
The winner of Friday's game will meet the region's top seed and host, Roberts Wesleyan (13-1) on Sunday.
Bentley capped its run through the NE10 playoffs by knocking off the seven-time winners Adelphi in the final on Sunday. Graduate student goalie Eliza Bresler, the Most Outstanding Player of the tournament, made nine saves, including a save from a close range on Adelphi's final possession to preserve the lead.
Seniors Julia Glavin and Cara McCarthy were also named to the All-Tournament team. Glavin was Bentley's leading scorer with 13 points in the tournament (8 goals, 5 assists), and McCarthy had five goals and a team high 14 draw controls.
Bresler will enter the NCAAs with a sterling 12-2 record, a 7.60 goals against average and a .605 save percentage. She leads Division II in save percentage, has the 3rd most saves (158) and has the 7th best GAA.
Bentley's postseason run began as the No. 1 seed in the Northeast Division. They claimed the NE Division regular season title with an 8-2 record.
The run got off to a tough start against Assumption. The two meetings in the regular season were split between the teams and both decided by three goals, and this one was even closer. The Falcons won it in double overtime when freshman Caroline Affolter scored with 1:36 left in the second OT.
Next up was Saint Anselm in the division semifinals. Another team Bentley split with in the regular season. Bentley led 8-3 at halftime, but a 6-0 run by the Hawks to start the 2nd half erased that lead. The Falcons though persevered and scored the game's final four goals to claim a 13-10 victory and book a place in the finals.
Making their first NE10 finals appearance since 2007, Bentley put on an outstanding defensive performance. While Glavin paced the attack, she had a hand in seven of the team's nine goals with two goals and five assists, it was other players that stepped up during a key stretch in the game.
Adelphi led 6-4 with 19:46 remaining in the game. While the Bentley defense kept them off the scoreboard for the next 11-plus minutes, four different players scored goals to put Bentley in front. Affolter, freshman Courtney Dermody, junior Kayli Keenan and sophomore Sydney Lynch all scored during a 4-0 run that gave Bentley an 8-6 lead with 11:44 to go.
Bentley scored once more, off the stick off Kenzie Lupton with 5:02 remaining to take a 9-7 lead, then clamped down defensively on Adelphi to secure the win.
The Falcons beat six top-20 teams during the regular season. Assumption and Saint Anselm twice, Adelphi and New Haven.
Mercy went 12-2 with its only two defeats to Roberts Wesleyan, both by one goal. They went 5-0 in the ECC regular season, including a win over RWU on May 1. They defeated St. Thomas Aquinas 20-8 in the ECC semifinals, before they fell to RWU 10-9 in the finals.
The Mavericks feature the ECC Defensive Player of the Year in junior Micayla Brady and the Goalie of the Year in senior Emma Jacobsen. Their leading scorer is ECC first team selection, junior Taylor Bishop, who has 37 goals entering Friday's game.
Bentley and Mercy have some very recent, and dramatic, history against each other. The last two games were in the 2020 and 2019 seasons, with each team winning on the other's home field, and both times the game came down to the final seconds.
The game in 2020 was on Feb. 29, just under two weeks before the rest of the season was cancelled due to the pandemic. Mercy won that game in Waltham 10-9 when Bishop scored the go-ahead goal with just six seconds remaining. Bentley then had a chance to tie, but a free-position shot by Glenna Gies with .2 seconds left in the post.
The 2019 game was hosted by Mercy, and the Falcons won it 10-9 in overtime. Caroline Boudreau, then a freshman, scored the tying goal with just four seconds remaining to force overtime. Glavin then won it for Bentley in OT with a free-position goal 56 seconds into overtime.