Maggie Luzier scored four goals in Sunday's showdown with Flagler.
In a physical Gulf South Conference battle, the Lee women's lacrosse team came out on the short end of a 21-12 contest with Flagler on Sunday afternoon.
Unfortunately for the Lady Flames turnovers once again proved to be their Achilles heel. Lee dominated the draw control 27-9 but struggled to hold on to the ball, committing 27 mistakes while only causing 11 turnovers. Flagler got the turf and used the 27 turnovers to hold a 27-9 advantage in ground balls.
"We have a good lacrosse team that makes fundamental mistakes when we get in a hurry and that was the story of the game today. We had twice as many turnovers as we could allow and then expect to win. We still make small controllable mistakes when we are trying to maintain possession, so we have continued work to do in that area," said Lee head coach Derrel Martin.
Maggie Luzier and Brittney White led the scoring with four goals each while Callie Curtis and Megan Trout added a pair of scores.
White finished with 18 draw controls and now has 418 during her illustrious career.
Despite the physical nature of the contest, which featured six yellow cards on the Saints, coach Martin praised his team's effort and sportsmanship, "I am so very proud of our team for respectfully honoring the game of lacrosse even when things got rough today. Out team plays clean lacrosse, but the game situation doesn't always reward us accordingly. When we were fouled, we did well on our free position shots going eight for ten. Brittney White was dominant on draw controls with eighteen and she added four goals. Maggie Luzier had a productive day with four goals and one assist."
Kaleigh Bernard started in goal for the Lady Flames and worked the first 20:23 in goal before giving way to Caleigh Smith.
Lexie Morton led the Saints with six goals and Katelyn Trainor added five. Flagler out shot the Lady Flames 35-24. Lee was efficient in the offensive zone, placing 21 of 24 shots on goal.
The Lady Flames scored the final three goals of the first half to cut Flagler's lead to three at 11-8. The Saints would open things up though with a 6-1 run through the first 10 minutes of the third to regain control of the match.
The Lady Flames fall to 5-6 and 0-1 in the GSC. Flagler improves to 9-1 and 1-0. The road trip continues Friday as Lee travels to Limestone before jumping back into conference play with a road trip to Lander on Sunday. The Lady Flames will conclude the four-game road trip on April 12 at Young Harris before finally returning home for a battle with Montevallo on April 15.
"We will work hard on our stick skills and ground balls this week and go back on the road to Limestone on Friday. Next Sunday brings another key GSC game when we travel to Lander University," concluded Smith.