Bears Fall On The Road To No. 13 Florida, 20-7

Saturday, March 16

Gainesville, Fla.

Noon

Mercer University

3-4

Florida

7-2

Mercer

Florida

Bears Fall On The Road To No. 13 Florida, 20-7

3/16/2024 2:38:00 PM | Women's Lacrosse

Box Score

GAINESVILLE, Fla. - The Mercer women's lacrosse team fell on the road to No. 13 Florida, 20-7 on Saturday afternoon in Gainesville, Florida.

Florida entered the game with the second most draw controls per game in the country at just over 18 per game and ended the game with 20 draw controls to Mercer's 10.

Kayla Soltys led Mercer offensively with two goals to go with five draw controls. Five other Mercer players each had one goal on the afternoon.

Defensively Mercer had five caused turnovers to Florida's six. Vanderlinde made five saves in goal for the Bears.

HOW IT HAPPENED
Florida scored two early goals to take a 2-0 lead before Kayla Soltys scored her first goal of the game to make it 2-1 Florida.

After four straight goals from the Gatros, Maddi Koury found Kaileigh Wallace in front of the goal who put her shot passed the Florida goalie to make it 6-2 Gators with more than four minutes to play in the first quarter. Florida would make the most of its possessions in the final minutes of the quarter, scoring four goals in the last four minutest to jump out to a 10-2 lead.

The Gators continued to win the draws in the second quarter preventing Mercer from getting many possessions and led 16-2. Sandy Salit scored a free position goal just before halftime for her eighth goal of the season.

Florida led 20-5 midway through the fourth quarter before Mercer got goals from Ansley Walters and Soltys to close out the game.

NOTABLES

Florida entered the game as the best clearing team in the country, successfully clearing 126-of-129 attempts. The Bears forced one unsuccessful clear for Florida as the Gators went 8-for-9 on clears
Mercer put 19-of-22 shots on goal for a shot percentage of 86.4%; the best shots on goal percentage in a game this season for Mercer
Kayla Soltys now has at least two goals and four draw controls in six of Mercer's seven games this season
Freshman Ansley Walters scored her 10th goal of the season. She has scored in every game this season
Salit scored her third free position goal of the season

The Bears will be off for a week before welcoming No. 8 Notre Dame to Macon on Sunday, March 24 in a rematch of the NCAA Tournament First Round game from last year.

FOLLOW THE BEARS
For complete coverage of Mercer Women's Lacrosse, please follow the Bears on social media at @MercerWLAX (Twitter) and @Mercerwlax (Instagram) or visit the official home of Mercer Athletics at MercerBears.com.