DU women’s lacrosse eliminated by Northwestern in NCAA Tournament

The University of Denver women’s lacrosse team ran into a familiar roadblock Sunday afternoon.

The Northwestern Wildcats eliminated the Pioneers from the NCAA Tournament for the second year in a row, rolling to a 17-4 victory on their home turf in Evanston, Ill.

The No. 1 overall seed netted 13 goals in the first half to take a commanding 10-goal lead into the break, then cruised from there to halt the Pios’ tournament run two wins shy of a return trip to the Final Four.

The Wildcats (16-2) scored the game’s first five goals before Julia Gilbert got DU on the board with a goal with 6:54 left in the first period. Northwestern’s Izzy Scane set a new standard for women’s lacrosse goal-scoring as part of the run, topping Boston College and Duke product Charlotte North’s NCAA record 358 career goals.

Gilbert finished with two goals for DU, while Lauren Black and Sloane Kipp added goals of their own, but it wasn’t near enough to match the reigning national champions’ offensive firepower. Northwestern beat DU 15-7 in last year’s Final Four en route to its eighth national title.

The Pioneers (16-4) reached the NCAA Tournament for the sixth consecutive season, excluding the 2020 COVID year. Thanks to a 13-12 victory over Stanford on Friday, they’ve won at least one tournament game in each of those six trips. They also won the Big East tournament for the fourth year in a row.