BLACKSBURG – Set up for success by Sarah Gresham's 14 draw controls, which allowed her to break the program's single-season draw control record, Virginia Tech earned a 17-11 win over Furman on Monday afternoon.
Now sitting at 100 draw controls on the season, Long Valley, N.J. native Gresham surpassed Tristan McGinley's mark of 96 draw controls in a season set in 2018. Furthermore, the rookie owns the most draw controls in NCAA Division I women's lacrosse by a freshman.
Tech had four players score three-or-more goals on Monday: Olivia Vergano (4), Maura O'Malley (3), Ella Rishko (3) and Paige Tyson (3).
For a third consecutive game, the Hokies jumped out to an early lead with a four-goal first quarter. Tyson opened the scoring just 40 seconds into the game off a feed from Claire Schotta. Vergano didn't waste much time scoring her first of a game-high four goals, as she doubled Tech's score with 11:21 remaining in the first quarter. O'Malley converted from the 8-meter shortly after then Tyson scored her second to cap off the Hokies' 4-0 run.
The Paladins responded with a 3-1 run, interrupted by Rishko's first score, before Tech responded with another 4-0 run. This time Vergano, Rishko, Caroline Little and Hannah Mardiney spurred on Virginia Tech into halftime with a 9-3 lead -- its largest at intermission since leading Louisville by eight on April 8.
Tech's most dominant play came in the third quarter, as Gresham and Vergano teamed up to claim all seven draws in the period. The Hokies out-shot the visitors 11-2 in the quarter and forced the Paladins into four turnovers. Kayla Rinaldi added her name into the scoresheet, as well.
Whitney Liebler became the eighth different scorer on the day for the Hokies early on in the fourth quarter. However, Furman had its most productive quarter of the game in the fourth, netting six goals to cut into Tech's lead that was once as large as 11 goals.
Jocelyn Torres saw subdued action in the cage, needing to make only four saves in 38 minutes of play. Meanwhile, Lilly Kannapell made her sixth appearance of the season for the closing 21:10 of the game.
