By Kevin Carroll – STAFF WRITER
In a weekend and season of close games for Hofstra, none were as down-to-the-wire as their fourth CAA matchup against the Towson Tigers.
The Pride’s road trip continued over the weekend, heading down to Maryland for a matchup against Towson. Towson looked to climb into a tie for first with a win, but another great effort from the Pride defense – and the usual brilliant performance from Brittain Altomare – kept the Pride alone in first with a heart-stopping, 8-7 victory in double overtime against the Tigers on Sunday.
Altomare was not to be denied by the Tigers. She scored two goals and assisted on three others. Defender Lindsey Alfano notched a hat trick to lead the Pride in scoring. Kelsey Greggerson produced 10 saves, her third time in double-digits this season.
In a first half featuring lots of back-and-forth action, neither team gained a clear advantage, as the lead for either team never grew past two goals.
Alfano opened the scoring for the Pride just over five minutes into the match, but was quickly answered by Towson’s Paige Duncan.
Hofstra looked poised to take control with three straight goals assisted by Altomare, to take a 5-3 lead. However, the Tigers rattled off three consecutive goals of their own to take a 6-5 lead into halftime.
The second half proved to be in stark contrast to the first, as goals were hard to come by for both sides, which was in large part due to some great goalkeeping from Greggerson and Kelsea Donnelly at the other end of the field. Tiana Parrella tied it up at six, but Towson took the lead right back less than a minute later thanks to Paige Duncan’s second goal of the game.
A couple of minutes later, at the 21:57 mark, Alfano completed her hat trick by netting the equalizer for the Pride, knotting up the match at seven. With no more scoring from there, the match was forced into overtime.
The first OT period was no different as both teams failed to score any winning goals, but The second OT period was almost disastrous. Andi Raymond seemed to have scored the game-winner for the Tigers, only for the goal to be disallowed by the officials. This was due to a new rule stating that if the stick scoring the game-winning goal could not be immediately located for a stick check, the goal would not be allowed. This breathed new life into the contest, as Altomare took advantage of the call, scoring the game-winner 2:54 into the period, sending the Pride home happy, and still in first, with an 8-7 victory.
The win was the Pride’s fourth in a row, and the team improved to 9-4 on the season, remaining unbeaten in CAA play with a 4-0 mark.
Hofstra’s next match will be at Elon and will start at 5 p.m. on Saturday.
