Louisville was nearing a 17-minute scoring drought, with no answers for the Syracuse offensive onslaught.

The Orange players came out and fully executed Gary Gait’s game plan. Earlier in the week Gait said the balance on offense needed to propel the Orange past Louisville. His players did just that, displaying a wide array of scoring threats en route to a 19-7 win over Cardinals in front of 630 in the Carrier Dome.

Headed into the half, the Cards were down 12-3. Syracuse was outshooting Louisville 22-to-10. Six minutes into the second half No. 6 Syracuse already had eight scorers on the board.

“We started out slow on the shooting,” said head coach Gary Gait, “but the hustle on the play and the sharpness was there.

With the big lead midway through, the Orange came back out still focused. Gait credits the team for managing its the mental lapses to dominate the early minutes of the second half.

Only shooting 12 shots in the second half, the offense came out clicking stronger and faster as the Orange added four more goals in seven minutes to a 10-0 run.

Straight out of the break, Amy Cross, Kelly Cross and Brenna Rainone, each found the back of the net to extend the Syracuse lead to 12.

“The team came out ready to play,” said Gait. “They all worked on hustle and played a great game. I was very happy with the effort.”

Leading scorer Alyssa Murray already netted four goals and two assists and senior attack Michelle Tumolo was riding her best performance since the Orange played UConn at home in March.

Though the senior leaders contributed heavily to the win, SU was more pleased with everyone’s involvement.

“I think that’s what we’ve been missing,” Tumolo said. “Our offense hasn’t really been clicking, we’ve been getting goals but we haven’t really been doing a lot of assisting.”

Six different SU players tallied assists.

“That’s our game, we like to make plays,” Tumolo said. “I think that’s been helping that people have been stepping up and having confidence with the ball.”

The team’s poise with the ball also helped minimize the turnovers it struggled with last weekend at Rutgers. Syracuse also dominated the draw controls against Louisville’s lead draw controller Monica Negron. She won zero faceoffs.

The Cardinals tried to piece together a second-half run when Gait put in goaltender Alyssa Costantino in her return from minor injuries suffered in a car accident last Sunday.

The Cardinals netted three consecutive goals against Costantino but she came up with big saves to end the run.

“She’s definitely the heart of our team,” senior midfielder Bridget Daley said. “She’s so positive and it was just great to have her back.”

Falling into rhythm quickly Costantino ended the game with five saves after playing for 21 minutes and 39 seconds.

Through strong defense and a solid showing on offense Daley hopes the confidence the team played with today carries over as the Orange plays its next five games in the span of 10 days. Daley said this is the first game where SU actually played a solid game free of mental errors.

Said Daley: “I think he (Gait) wanted us to put together a full 60 minutes and we haven’t really done that yet this year.”

Published on April 12, 2013 at 11:46 pm

Contact Melissa: qsbronso@syr.edu