Syracuse falls 9-8 to No. 7 seed Yale in NCAA Tournament 2nd Round
Syracuse fell 9-8 to Yale in the second round of the NCAA Tournament, ending attack Emma Ward's career. Courtesy of SU Athletics
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NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Do or die. The phrase determines the difference between success and failure. Prosper and survive. Falter and face the consequences.
At this point in her fourth season at the helm, Syracuse head coach Kayla Treanor knows her squad feels the heat of the moment. After a tumultuous season full of more downs than usual for the program, the Orange did just enough to get past Brown with a persistent mentality.
Though for an encore performance, SU ran out of magic.
As the Orange trailed by one with seconds to play, they couldn’t find an open look. Ashlee Volpe cooled down since her four-goal first half. Emma Ward was nowhere to be found. With its season on the line, all SU could muster was a blocked shot from freshman Bri Peters, who was carded on her follow through for a stick infraction, sealing the loss for the Orange.
Syracuse (10-9, 5-4 Atlantic Coast) fell to No. 7 seed Yale (16-3, 5-2 Ivy League) 9-8 Sunday in the NCAA Tournament Second Round, ending its worst season under Treanor with its earliest exit too. Postgame, Treanor looked at the positive: each player who scored for the Orange was an underclassman. The team united after its three-game skid to end the regular season.
“We were going down a bad stretch at the very end of the regular season, and had a couple of losses,” Treanor said. “Then the group really came together when we got in (the NCAA Tournament).”
However, the script was eerily similar for SU – almost as if Treanor and Co. are simply following it. A culmination of a season’s work ended in a second-half collapse. And for the 27th straight season, the Orange failed to win the national title.
Starting midway through the second quarter and lasting until the start of the fourth, SU led the Bulldogs for 24 consecutive minutes. But just as the final frame began, Yale cut into Syracuse’s three-goal lead to tie the game at 7-7. Its attack went cold, but after a lengthy 10-minute stoppage for a review, freshman Caroline Trinkaus put the Orange back in front on a free position.
With seven minutes left, Jenna Collignon tallied her second of the day to tie the game again. Ward failed to get anything going after a six-point outing two days prior, turning the ball over four times and recording just one point. Meanwhile, Collignon scored her third goal in the fourth quarter to give Yale its first lead in 37 minutes, which was ultimately the goal that ended SU’s year.
Yale entered the contest riding an eight-game winning streak on its way to the Ivy League Tournament title, dating back to its win over Syracuse on April 2. Though, the hot streak for Yale was initially stymied by the Orange. SU goalie Daniella Guyette made just two saves against Brown, but quickly made two stops on Yale’s first possession as the Orange defense forced attackers out wide.
Despite a defensive battle across the first nine minutes, the Bulldogs broke through with two strikes in one minute. Taylor Lane struck first before dishing to Fallon Vaughn, who went behind the back from point-blank range to double the lead. Yale’s attack, led by Lane, Vaughn and leading goal scorer Collignon, averaged nearly 14 goals per game through its first 18 games.
The Orange needed to shut down the trio to stay within striking distance. And despite another goal by the Bulldogs to create a 3-0 lead, Ashlee Volpe manufactured a 2-0 run of her own to cut the deficit to one at the end of the first quarter.
As Syracuse crept back into the game, its draw control found a groove. After losing the first three battles in the circle, the Orange won four straight with Meghan Rode leading the way. SU forced a shot clock violation on Yale’s first possession of the second frame, and Alexa Vogelman followed with a score to knot the game at 3-3.
While Syracuse’s attack was limited against the Bulldogs on April 2, Volpe was the key contributor. Her vendetta against Yale continued Sunday, as she handed the Orange their first lead and extended it minutes later with a backhanded shovel amid a 5-0 run.
The Bulldogs eventually broke a 15-minute scoring drought, as Lane scored at the end of the half. But SU, and largely Volpe, were in command. At halftime, both Syracuse and Yale went into the locker room to regroup. However, Rode stayed out to work on the draw control, looking to seal the deal in the circle.
When the Orange fell to the Bulldogs over a month ago, Rode’s struggles on the draw hampered any consistent success. But in the first half Sunday, she corralled four to build a 6-5 advantage. Directly out of the gate in the second half, Rode built off her momentum to give SU added possessions. Trinkaus found the back of the net a few minutes in and, as the shot clock winded down, Ward tallied her only point of the day on a dish to Peters.
Then came delays. Multiple lengthy reviews slowed the game down in the third quarter, and 15 minutes of gametime ended up taking 41 to play. One was for the ejection of Yale star Sky Carrasquillo, who picked up her second yellow card before the call was reversed into a flop on SU’s Sam DeVito. Then, a charge on Trinkaus was switched into a penalty on the Bulldogs, taking nearly 12 minutes to figure out the call and then the shot clock. Treanor said she felt the stoppages of the game affected the rhythm of SU’s attack.
“It felt like such an odd game to be playing in the second half. It felt like a completely different game in the first half,” Treanor said.
While SU held down Collignon to zero goals until the final frame, Vaughn worked the Bulldogs back into the game with two scores in one minute, producing a one-goal game entering the fourth quarter.
As Guyette continued her stellar day, saving 11-of-20 shots, Syracuse’s defense locked down as much as it could. But Yale was too much to handle as Collignon took over.
A season ago, the Bulldogs and the Orange faced a do-or-die situation in the NCAA Tournament Quarterfinal. SU decimated Yale, advancing to the Final Four.
This time around, Syracuse collapsed down the stretch, killing its season despite a slight revival Friday. Treanor praised her team for not folding amid its poor stretches. She said the team could’ve given up, especially during its worst offensive performance ever. But her group did the opposite in her eyes, flipping the script to beat Brown and nearly upsetting the Bulldogs.
At the end of each season, Treanor said she reflects on each season in a notebook. What went right? What went wrong? But for the first time in her coaching career, she has a few more weeks to find those answers, as she exits the NCAA Tournament at the earliest point yet.
