ERIE, Pa. – The Mercyhurst Women's Water Polo team split a pair of games on Saturday at the Penn State Behrend Invite. The Lakers claimed victory over the host Lions 13-10 in their first game of the day; they followed with a 17-7 defeat to Salem in WWPA Conference play.

Game One 

The Lakers jumped out to a 5-2 lead after the end of the first quarter. Behrend struck first just 32 seconds into the opening frame before the Lakers rattled off four consecutive goals. Sara Marin scored twice for Mercyhurst while Alexa Anderberg, and Hanna Good had the other two Laker scores on the run. Behrend would respond with a goal with 1:32 remaining in the quarter followed by an Ava Gebhardt goal for the Lakers with just a second remaining on the first quarter clock.

The Lakers tacked on four additional goals in the second quarter to go up 9-3 entering the halftime break. Mercyhurst received two goals from Rachel Vlietstra with additional tallies from Emma Ruttinger and Phoebe Saunders in the quarter.

Vlietstra completed her hat-trick to begin the third quarter before Behrend went on a 3-0 scoring run that would last for a good duration of the third quarter. Good halted the Behrend run with 43 second remaining in the quarter to put the Lakers up 11-6 entering the final eight minutes of play. 

In the fourth quarter Penn State Behrend would go on another scoring run, this time with four consecutive goals, however tallies from Allie Dombkowski and Vlietstra would help close out the win for the Lakers.

Marley Ramon played all 32 minutes in the cage for Mercyhurst, she stopped seven of the 17 Lion shots that were put on target.

Game Two

In their second game of the day against WWPA foe Salem, it was the Tigers who scored the game's first five goals before Sakura Gavin scored two straight for the green and white to put the score at 5-2 with 7:25 remaining in the first half. Salem would close out the half on another 5-0 scoring run to give the Tigers a 10-2 advantage at the halftime whistle.

In the second half, Good produced a hat-trick for the Lakers while Gebhardt scored her second of the day, however it was not enough as Salem went on to take the victory.

The Lakers will return to action next Saturday at the Hallman Aquatics Center in Erie for their final two regular season games of the season against McKendree and Gannon.