(Dryden, NY)  The women woke up to quite the surprise the morning of the game.  Mother nature had decided that the beautiful Fall backdrop of the Upstate New York setting needed a new color.  Roughly three inches of snow had fallen over night and the wind was hollowing through the mountains outside the hotel.  With temperatures below 20 degrees (in the single digits with the wind), the team bundled up and got to work.

Winning the coin toss before the game the Lions chose to go with the wind.  This was the biggest decision of the game and it paid off big time.  The Madison Wolfpack did everything they could to try to move the ball out of their half, but the constant pressure from the Lions and the strong winds thwarted any attempt to play the ball toward Bridget Treissl's net.

The Lions got on the board in the 17th minute when Haley Schmidt took a long range shot that dropped in over the Madison keeper's outstretched hands.  Twenty minutes later Kayla Murphy took a shot from the top of the arch that was aided by the conditions and found its way through to the net once again.  With a 2-0 lead into the half the team was feeling great!

The second half the Lions felt the cruelty of Mother Nature.  The conditions seemed to get worse and the wind continued to pick up speed.  Five minutes into the second half the Wolfpack with the help of the wind dropped a shot from the side past the Lions keeper and it was suddenly a much closer game.  Coach Megaloudis was not worried.

"We have a great defense, Lemus, Polidora, and Cianni did their job well.  The wind and conditions are tough but they are strong physically and mentally." – Coach Megaloudis

The midfield held the ball the best it could, Sullivan,Schmidt, Maybie, Carbajal, and Jones were work horses, doing everything they could to get the ball out and away from the Lions half.

In the end the game finished 2-1 and the Lions won their first nationals game and secured their spot in the next round to play for 5th or 6th in the country.