HANOVER, Ind. (April 28) – The Saint Vincent women's lacrosse team closed the game with four unanswered goals to rally for a dramatic 15-14 victory over Hanover College in the Ohio River Lacrosse Conference regular season finale. 

Trailing by a 14-11 score with just 9:53 to play, Saint Vincent scored the final four goals of the game, including the eventual game-winner by senior Maggie Nelson off a pass from junior Naomi Schwaiger with 3:01 to play. The goal came just 27 seconds after sophomore Rachel Belles scored on a free position shot to tie the contest at 14-14. 

Nelson recorded a new single-game program record with 13 goals in the contest, stretching her season total to 137 and her career total to 360. Saturday marked the 11th time in 15 games this season that Nelson recorded 10 or more goals. 
 
The host Panthers opened the contest with back-to-back goals to take an early 2-0 advantage over the Bearcats.
 
However, Saint Vincent stormed back with six straight goals, all by Nelson, taking a 6-2 lead over Hanover with 15:26 left in the first half. That run forced Hanover to use two timeouts during that span.
 
Junior goalkeeper Maria Franey played a strong role in holding the Panthers without a goal for nearly 15 minutes during the offensive run for SVC.
 
Hanover would counter with a run of its own, scoring four of the final five goals over the final 11:52 of the half to cut the Bearcat lead to 7-6 at halftime. The lone goal by Saint Vincent during that time was a free position goal by Nelson.
 
The Panthers opened the second half with a goal to tie the game. Nelson helped SVC respond as she scored to give SVC an 8-7 lead at the 27:27 mark of the second half.
 
Hanover would regain the lead with three straight goals to take a 10-8 with 21:41 left. After Nelson tallied another score to cut the deficit to a single goal, the Panthers used back-to-back scores to take a 12-9 advantage.
 
Saint Vincent continued to battle as Nelson recorded her 10^th goal of the game and then added an assist on a goal by Belles that cut the Hanover lead to 12-11 with around 13 minutes left. Hanover looked poised to claim the win after stretching the advantage to 14-11 with just inside of 10 minutes remaining. However, that is when the Bearcats made their late comeback to victory. 
 
Franey played a big role in the Bearcat comeback, as the junior goalkeeper made a career-high 19 saves and added a team-best eight ground balls. Belles put together another strong performance in the midfield, filling the stat sheet with three points, eight caused turnovers, six ground balls and four draw controls. The four draw controls puts her over the century mark for the season, as the sophomore has racked up an ORLC best 101 this year. Alex Piampiano added a team-best and career-high seven draw controls while also picking up four ground balls in the victory. 

The win improves Saint Vincent to 12-3 overall and 9-2 in ORLC play. Hanover falls to 11-6 overall and 8-3 in league contests.

Both teams have qualified for the four-team ORLC Women's Lacrosse Tournament, which will held on May 4-5 at top-seeded Transylvania University. The win clinches the #3 seed for Saint Vincent, while Hanover settles for the #4 spot. 

Saint Vincent will face second-seeded Washington and Jefferson in the semifinals on Friday, May 4. Start time to be announced.