May 14, 2006
Davis, Calif. - The No. 2 seed Cardinal bounced back from a tough loss on Saturday against No. 3 seed UCLA with an 8-5 victory over No. 4 seed Hawaii to capture 3rd Place in the NCAA Championships on Sunday afternoon at UC Davis' Schaal Aquatics Center. For the third straight game, senior Scotti Shafer (Carlsbad, CA) led the attack for head coach John Tanner's squad as Stanford finished the season with a 24-5 record. Hawaii finished 18-12.
Shafer got the Cardinal on the board first with a skip-shot at the 4:20 mark of the opening period, but the Rainbow Wahine answered back with an ejection goal at 2:40. Stanford added an ejection goal of their own to take a 2-1 lead on a shot by sophomore Jacquelyn Gauthier (Irvine, CA) with just over a minute left in the period.
The second frame proved to be all Cardinal as Stanford put three shots into the net while holding Hawaii scoreless. Shafer scored her second goal of the match at 5:35 to give Stanford the 3-1 lead, and fellow senior Nancy El-Sakkary (Dollar des Ormeaux, Quebec) scored an ejection goal one minute later to make it 4-1. Freshman Jessica Steffens (Danville, CA) capped the half with an ejection goal at 1:56 to make it 5-1 heading into halftime.
When the teams reconvened, it was Steffens with her second goal of the match and Stanford's fifth unanswered goal that got the action started at 3:52 in the period. Down 6-1, however, the Rainbow Wahine were not about to throw in the towel. UH's Kelly Mason answered back on the ensuing possession to bring the score to 6-2, and a couple minutes later, teammate Iefke Van Belkum reached the back of the net to cut Stanford's lead to 6-3. Looking for an answer to Hawaii's rally, the Cardinal turned to freshman Lauren Silver (Long Beach, CA), who was good for a goal at the 0:44 mark to stretch Stanford's lead back to four goals heading into the final frame.
At 6:44 in the fourth, it was Silver again who came up big for the Cardinal as she put a 4-meter penalty shot into the back of the net to make it 8-3 in favor of Stanford. UH scored a couple more goals late in the game, but Stanford's defense clamped down when duty called. As the buzzer sounded, the Cardinal logged the 8-5 victory and took 3rd Place in the NCAA Championships for the second consecutive season.
Junior goalkeeper Meridith McColl (Mission Viejo, CA) finished with 10 saves and a pair of assists. With the 3rd Place finish, the Cardinal have now ended all nine seasons under Coach Tanner no lower than 3rd in the NCAAs, including a 1st Place finish in 2002.
NCAA Championships Third Place Game
No. 4 Hawaii (18-12)1022=5
No. 2 Stanford (24-5)2321=8
Hawaii Goals: Mason 3, Bagnall 1, I. Van Belkum 1.
Stanford Goals: Shafer 2, Steffens 2, Silver 2, Gauthier 1, El-Sakkary 1.