ATCHISON, Kan. – Getting the first win of the season is always a sweet feeling, but Missouri Baptist women's lacrosse achieved the ultimate first win on Thursday evening. The Spartans pulled out a thriller of A victory on the road against the defending NAIA national champions and No. 1 ranked Benedictine College (BC), sending a message to the rest of the NAIA women's lacrosse community that MoBap means business.
No. 8 Missouri Baptist (1-1) handed Benedictine (2-1) its first loss in nearly a year behind a monster of a day from senior
Chayleb Deves and a persevering effort to win, 13-12. Winless in their last four meetings against the Ravens, over which period the Spartans were outscored 76-15, MBU flipped the script. The visitors outshot BC 38-to-29, won the draw control battle 16-to-13, and, most importantly, finished with more balls in the back of the cage than the Ravens for the first time since 2017.
The Spartans struck first with a goal one minute in from sophomore
Mack Miller (1:01) that was assisted by senior
Jordan Haeusser. The hosts came surging back from the early deficit and quickly scored the next three before Deves logged her first of the game (5:48). MBU again would fall behind 5-2 for the second game in a row after two more Raven goals, the second coming from BC midfielder Courtney Frankfurth that finished off a first quarter hat trick to wrap a wild first 15 minutes that saw seven goals in total.
Frankfurth and Deves battled for the points lead all game long, as the former ended the game with five goals from seven shots, while the latter did one better and ended the evening with six on seven attempts at net. Deves equaled her career high and ran her goal tally at MBU to 98 with the performance.
The Spartans rapidly got back in the game, scoring the next four and regaining the lead 6-5. A second from Deves (15:36), back-to-back finishes by
Lydia Cornett (16:29, 18:44) and the second of the day by Miller (22:27) were followed with an equalizer by BC to send the proceedings to the half all knotted at 6-6. Deves again opened a quarter with a goal in the third before Benedictine scored three-in-a-row and looked like it would runaway.
Deves then decided to put the team on her back and took over. The Ellisville, Mo. product rattled off three goals in succession of her own in under a two and a half minute interval to make the score 10-9. Cornett (46:55) and
Brianna Fischer (49:11) opened the final period with scores to finish off the 5-0 run that gave MBU a three-goal cushion. The Ravens did not go quietly and got within one before senior
Kamryn Bell put away the eventual game-winner (55:33).
A last-ditch effort by BC to send the game into overtime was met by the Spartan defense, and as the final seconds ticked off the clock, the MoBap players were sent into a frenzy and mobbed each other in their own half, jumping for joy knowing they had upset the reigning national champions.
Goalkeeper
Amelia Shaw was a force between the pipes, making 12 saves. Defender
Loryn Dotson logged the lone caused turnover for MBU and scooped three ground balls to tie with Haesser and Fischer for second in the category behind Cornett (4). Haeusser was the lone distributor for MoBap, divvying out three assists for all three of her points on the game. The senior also had six draw conrols, the second most for either side, one ahead of
Caroline Karr with five.
"Absolutely nuts," head coach
Max Ruhl said of the win. "Beyond proud of this group and their heart to play for each other. Everyone doing their role and accepting their responsibilities made it happen."
Missouri Baptist will move on and make the second journey of their two-game road trip with a matchup against Missouri Valley College on Saturday, Mar. 4th at 2:00 PM.
