RIPON, Wis. - The Red Hawks ended their longest losing streak of the season at three games Wednesday afternoon, defeating Lawrence University, 5-1, to guarantee their second-consecutive season of five wins in conference play. Ripon controlled the ball for much of the day, outshooting the Vikings 23-11, marking the 11th time in 15 games the Red Hawks have held the shot advantage.
Brandi Peltier got the scoring started in the 15th minute when she gave Ripon (9-6-0, 5-2-0 MWC) a 1-0 lead with her 13th goal of the season on assists from
Jamie Wegner and
Kaylee Tadych. That's where the score would stay until the 37th minute when the two teams combined for three goals in a one-minute span.
Paige Birschbach's 13th goal of the season gave Ripon a 2-0 advantage thanks to another assist from Tadych, but that lead was cut in half 39 seconds later when Lawrence (4-10-2, 2-4-2 MWC) got on the board with a goal by Keli Muchowski. Fifteen seconds after that, Ripon scored again, as
Morgan Johnson found the back of the net for the second time this season, assisted by Peltier.
After taking a 3-1 lead into halftime, the Red Hawks put the game away in the second period. Five and a half minutes into the period, Tadych netted her eighth goal of the year on Peltier's second assist of the contest. In the 78th minute, the roles were reversed, as Peltier notched her second goal of the game and team-leading 14th of the season on Tadych's third assist of the day.
Ripon's
Sidney Blodgett recorded four saves in her 90 minutes of work in goal. Lawrence was led by Dani Glass, who saved five shots in 88 minutes of work as the Vikings' Goal Keeper.
The Red Hawks are now one game closer to clinching a spot in the four-team Midwest Conference Tournament, as they currently sit in fourth place. They can separate themselves further from the rest of the pack this weekend, as they'll travel to Cornell College to play the fifth-place Rams. That game will begin at 1:30 p.m. in Mount Vernon, Iowa and can be seen live, along with LiveStats, at,
http://portal.stretchinternet.com/ripon/.