NEW BRITAIN, Conn. (April 16, 2010) – The two teams combined for a total of 79 shots, but it was the Saint Francis lacrosse team that came out on the wrong side of the 23-17 decision as they fell to the Central Connecticut State Blue Devils on Friday afternoon in New Britain.

Kimberly Peterson (Sewell, N.J./Washington Twp) and Danielle Pokusa (Cinnaminson, N.J./Cinnaminson) (Cinnaminson, N.J./Cinnaminson) teamed up to make nine stops in net for the Flash.  Freshman Danielle Conwell (Succasunna, N.J./Roxbury) led the offensive charge with 5 goals.

The Red Flash, who will wrap up their season on Sunday at Bryant, fall to 2-5 in the Northeast Conference and 6-9 overall.

CCSU scored soon after the opening draw, and added another a minute later to take a quick 2-0 lead.  Meaghan McCurry then notched a free-position goal for the Blue Devils, before Kate Simmons (Delran, N.J./Delran) (Delran, N.J./Delran) put SFU on the board after taking a feed from Sheri Fort (Sicklerville, N.J./Washington Twp) (Sicklerville, N.J./Washington Twp.) and sending it past CCSU's Erin Delancey with 25:47 left to play in the first half.

Betsey Vendel and MacKenzy Ryan each scored of passes from Ashley Mara to put the Blue Devils ahead by four.  Fort countered by scoring her first of the game, with Brittany Kovacs (Oshawa, Ontario/R.S. McLaughlin) (Oshawa, Ont./RS McLaughlin CVI) recording the assist on the play.  CCSU then tallied three straight before Stephanie Toomey (East Rochester, N.Y./East Rochester) scored to keep the Red Flash in the game at 10-4.

Mara and Conwell traded tallies before the Blue Devils sent in another three goals to stretch their lead to nine with 7:25 to go in the first half.  Conwell then notched her second of the game, while Catherine Helming (Canandaigua, N.Y./Canandaigua) (Canandaigua, N.Y./Canandaigua Academy) knocked in her first of the game with Kovacs picking up another assist.  CCSU's Ryan netted one more before the half ended to keep the Blue Devils ahead 15-8 with 30 minutes of action already in the books.

Mara opened the second half with an unassisted goal for the Blue Devils, but it was the Red Flash who got hot off the bat.  Kovacs notched her third assist of the day by sending a great pass over to Toomey, who converted for her second of the day.  Chelsea Kent (Winter Spring, Fla./Winter Spring) (Winter Springs, Fla./Winter Springs) scored her first of the game just over ten minutes into the second half.  Toomey then added another tally, this time taking the feed from Simmons to cut the Flash's deficit to just five.

However, Central Connecticut battled back, notching five straight goals, two of which came from Vendel, putting their lead in the double digits, Conwell converted on a free-position shot to cut the deficit back down to single digits before Simmons added in an unassisted goal to put the score at 21-13 with 9:47 remaining in the second half.
Conwell and Simmons attempted to make up some ground, each netting two in a span of four minutes for the Red Flash.  Ashley Perkoski tallied another for the Blue Devils, with Kovacs chipping in for SFU on an unassisted tally.  Michele Conway then netted CCSU's final goal of the game with just under four minutes left.  Seconds later, Katie Jenkins (Rochester, N.Y./Our Lady of Mercy) (Rochester, N.Y./Our Lady of Mercy) sent a pass from Kovacs into the net, but it wasn't nearly enough as the Red Flash took the 23-17 loss.

Pariss Townsend-Griffin (Silver Spring, Md./Elizabeth Seton) (Silver Spring, Md./Elizabeth Seton) and Alexa Joanow (Warwick, N.Y./Warwick Valley) each picked up four ground balls for the Flash, who had a total of 17 in the game.  Toomey and Conwell each had eight of the team's 27 shots, with Conwell also controlling the draw seven times.  Simmons had five draw controls.