LOUISVILLE, Ky.—The scoreboard showed a 3-0 victory for Bellarmine in its season finale against Frostburg State, but in reality, it wasn't even that close.
Playing in the final game of the DII Independent Postseason Tournament at Bellarmine's Frazier Stadium, the Knights peppered the Bobcats with 34 shots while yielding just four to the FSU offense. Bobcat goalie Sierra Smizer came up with 14 saves on the day, to keep the score close for the visitors.
The Knights dominated play throughout with Frostburg getting off only one shot on goal, and that was repelled by Bellarmine defender
Alexa Rastigue for her seventh defensive save of the year.
Bellarmine got on the board relatively quickly, getting into the circle and scoring with just 1:48 elapsed on the clock.
Teresa Schmidt dribble into the circle and centered a pass that Merit collected and redistributed to
Cassidy Sweeney who rifled the shot past Smizer for a quick 1-0 lead.
Smizer was successful on turning away nine Bellarmine shots in the opening 30 minutes but couldn't stop Harris in the game's 25th minute.
Mandi Isom found Harris through heavy traffic for a shot just in front of the cage and a 2-0 lead going into halftime. The goal was Harris' 15th on the season, giving her 34 in her career and tying Lauren Schmeing for 8th place on BU's all-time goals list.
A switch of the field direction, didn't slow down the Knights in the second half, outshooting the Bobcats 18-1 in the final 30 minutes. Of those 18 shots, only one found the back of the cage, and that came off the stick of
Lindsay Reynolds, who redirected a hard smash from Sweeney in the 50th minute.
Three Bellarmine goalies—
Heather Gregory,
Breanna McWhorter and
Brittanny Macnab—saw action on the day with Gregory picking up win number eight on the season. The Louisville native finishes her career 31 wins in cage, the second-most in program history.
The Knights finished 2-0 in the D2 Independent Tournament and posted the best record in the event, which was a round-robin featuring the only three DII teams without conference affiliations. Lindenwood, who the Knights defeated on Friday, finished 1-1 in the tourney with the Bobcats going winless.
The Knights closed the book on their 2019 season with today's win and finish with a 10-8 record.
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