CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — The Southern Vermont College women's soccer playoff run ended Thursday night with the fifth-seeded Mountaineers falling 2-0 Lesley University in a New England Collegiate Conference (NECC) semifinal round at Buckingham Browne & Nichols.
The top-seeded Lynx improve to 17-3 on the year while SVC finishes the season with an 8-11 overall mark.
Lesley wasted little time getting on the board as senior captain Hannah Landerholm (Edmonds, Washington) headed home a corner kick off the foot of sophomore Lindsey Bos (Valencia, California). Landerholm elevated over a slew of players in the box to make the connection and send the ball inside the far corner to give the hosts a 1-0 lead in the third minute of play.
LU broke through again with five minutes to go in the first half. Bos ripped a shot from the top of the box that bounced off the left post, but senior Marysol Flores (Pico Rivera, California) was in position to clean up the rebound as she deposited a goal from six yards out to give Lesley a 2-0 edge heading into halftime.
The Lynx nearly made it 3-0 just 1:44 into the second stanza when junior Melinda Robinson (Plano, Texas) drilled a screamer from the top left corner of the box, but Mountaineer keeper Melissa Mascari (Saratoga Springs, New York) made a terrific leaping save to send the ball over the crossbar. The freshman goalie came up big again for the visitors on the ensuing corner kick when she corralled a head ball from Isabella Vidana (San Marcos, California) to keep Lesley scoreless in the half.
LU junior keeper Jackie Berard (Coventry, Rhode Island) picked up the win, moving to 13-2 on the year in net, but she did not register the shutout after being replaced by freshman Lilly Donovan (Newburyport, Massachusetts) with 15 minutes to play. Mascari turned away 10 Lynx shots in the loss (8-11) before leaving the game due to injury with 31 minutes to go, the first time all year she did not spend between the pipes for the Mountaineers.
Mascari finishes the season with the third-most saves recorded (201) and the fifth-most shutouts (5) in program history. Her 1.62 goals against average does not crack the team's top three in a single season, but it does tie the best career GAA in SVC history, a mark set by Hall of Famer Thalia (Smith) Hudson.
Lesley will now go on to host Elms College on Saturday in the NECC Championship game.