Women’s lacrosse continued their rough start of the season, dropping back to back games to Holy Cross and Monmouth. The Blue Devils lost these games 16-1 and 18-4 respectively.

The lone goal for the CCSU against Holy Cross was scored by freshman Katelyn Parker, who now has three goals on the season which is the second-most on the team.

Junior goalkeeper, Cooper Cowdin made 13 saves for CCSU as Holy Cross held a 29-10 advantage in shots on goal.

In their second game of the week, Central welcomed Monmouth for their second home game of the season. The Blue Devils were led by junior Emma Sullivan and senior Morgan Sinton who had two goals each. Raphaela DaSilva added an assist.

The Blue Devils were playing a zone defense which consistently allowed the Hawks plenty of offensive opportunities. Monmouth had 13 free-position shots to Centrals three.

Betsy Vendel, who is now in her second season as head coach, was impressed with the defense performed throughout the game.

“The defense is working incredibly hard to create turnovers and in the midfield is definitely tough to keep coming back but our defense has really stepped up and to only have them score 18 despite how many turnovers we had is a positive,” Vendel said. “I’ll take 18 goals over how many they could have had.”

The team struggled to produce on offense which Vendel said they need to work on.

“We just have to be able to produce on attack, we had worked all week on transition and getting the ball down that end,” Vendel said. “We just have to produce.”

The Blue Devils lost the turnover battle 15-12 and this had a big impact on the game. Vendel said this is something they can work on in practice.

“We can just be harder on everyone in practice of the pressure we put on them to catch the ball,” Vendel said. “Game-like pressure and practice pressure is a little bit different, so being able to catch the ball under pressure, catch the ball when you have three people on you, is something we’re gonna have to practice.”

Vendel said she felt as though they were affected by inconsistent officiating.

“We definitely didn’t have any calls going our way so for them to keep their spirits up and their fight is impressive,” Vendel said. “It takes us out of our game a little but I think the defense did a good job of handling it and resetting after each call so they could produce.”

For the second game in a row, Central conceded at least 10 goals in the first half and was only able to score a total of four goals in the first half of both of these games.

The Hawks outshot CCSU 39-19 and 31-12 in shots on goal.

Vendel wasn’t too concerned with how many goals the Blue Devils were letting in and was more worried about their offensive struggles.

“Being down seven goals in lacrosse isn’t that bad, so the morale wasn’t bad in the locker room that wasn’t really the issue,” Vendel said. “The issue was trying to fix offensive struggles, being able to win the draw would be a lot more helpful, so we’re going to have to work on that.”

The Blue Devils are next in action at Iona, on Feb 26 at 3 p.m.