With her best friend from home, Brittany Shannon, on the opposing team, Kara Kelly '10 had a good reason to come out strong in the Bears' game against Columbia on Saturday at Lawrence Wien Stadium in New York.
"She's one of their leading scorers, so that probably helped," Kelly said. Shannon is the Lions' second-leading scorer, but the Bears held her to only two goals on Saturday.
The rest of the team found other reasons to trample the Lions over the weekend. This game marks the first time in the past five years that Brown has beat Columbia by more than one goal.
"We realized we had the ability to put the goals away at the end," said Lauren Vitkus '09, Brown's leading scorer who tallied three goals against Columbia. "We didn't want to be satisfied with a one-goal victory."
After its 11-7 win, the Bears' record improved to 5-5, 2-1 in the Ivy League, while the Lions' record fell to 3-7 and 0-5 in the league.
Despite this season's history of starting slow, the Bears played well in the first half.
"It's not that we're bad in the first half," Kelly said. "It's just that we're more fluid in the second."
Columbia initiated the scoring 3:14 into the game, but Brown countered with two of its own from Kelly and Noelle Digioia '09. The goals, both off free position shots, gave them a 2-1 lead 9:55 in.
The Lions tied the game a little more than three minutes later, but Brown gained the lead for the half with Kelly's second goal 20:47 in, followed by Vitkus' first of the day with less than two minutes remaining until the intermission.
After a Brown goal following the break, the Lions went on a run with three straight goals, tying the game at five. This was the first time since the middle of the first half that Columbia wasn't trailing. But after a timeout, the Bears regrouped and were ready for their own chance to attack.
"We refocused and stuck to what we were doing," said Head Coach Keely McDonald '00.
Brown started off their comeback with two back-to-back unassisted goals, the first from Jess Nunn '09 and the second from Vitkus.
Nunn's goal "was our first of the second half," Vitkus said. "We went in at halftime up and then having her score that goal sparked us."
Columbia's Gabrielle Geronimos scored a minute later, but Brown, not wanting another close game, responded with three more goals to put the score at 10-6 with less than two minutes remaining.
"We all had the same mentality of not settling and capitalizing on the opportunities that we had," Vitkus said.
Geronimos, with a season-high of three goals, scored her and the Lions' final goal with 1:24 remaining. But Brown had the last say when with 49 seconds left Alexa Caldwell '11 tallied one more to make the final score 11-7.
"We were able to gain momentum in the second half," Vitkus said. "At halftime, we all had the same mentality that we could play better than how we were playing in terms of the team coming out a little slow."
The team says it's fired up and "looking forward to another Ivy game" as it moves further into the season this Friday when it matches up against Cornell at 5 p.m. at home.
