The ninth-ranked Siena Heights women's lacrosse team will open its season on Saturday with an 11 a.m. Wolverine-Hoosier Athletic Conference contest against Lawrence Tech. The matchup will take place at Detroit Country Day High School in Beverly Hills.
The Saints enter 2015 after their most successful season to date. Last year, SHU enjoyed a 9-10 overall record and 4-6 slate in WHAC play.
Returning players include a pair of All-WHAC First Team honorees from a year ago: junior Erin Kehn and sophomore Tabitha Ferguson.
Kehn recorded the program's first 100-point season a year ago. She finished with 82 goals and 18 assists to hit the century mark. Kehn also led the team with 69 draw controls.
Meanwhile, Ferguson was the WHAC Defensive Player of the Year as SHU's goalkeeper. She finished with a 9-8 record and 15.58 goals-against average. In 997:33 of gametime, she made 239 saves.
Also for the Saints, junior Sydney VanHoose is back after having a 47-point campaign in 2014. VanHoose finished with 27 points, 20 assists and 51 draw controls.
Junior Sabrina Snow and sophomore Aliisa Mason have returned to aid the Siena Heights attack. Both had 46 points last year. Mason finished with 37 goals and nine assists while Snow came through with 35 goals and 11 assists.
Defensively, the Saints return its top three groundballers from a year ago. Junior Margaret Hern is back after a 46-GB year. Snow had 43 groundballs while Alyssa Mullen, now a sophomore, finished with 41 groundballs.
Respect has been garnered by the young SHU program as the National Women's Lacrosse League voters selected the Saints as their ninth-ranked team on the preseason poll.
The Saints and two-time WHAC Coach of the Year Cindy Hill will have plenty of opportunities to build on the strides they made last year. Exactly half of SHU's 2015 games -- 8 of 16 -- are against teams rated on the NWLL preseason poll.
Siena Heights will meet three fellow ranked WHAC schools -- third-ranked Davenport, fourth-ranked Indiana Tech and fifth-ranked Aquinas -- in home-and-home series. The Saints are also slated to take on seventh-ranked Tennesee Wesleyan and No. 10 Midland (Neb.).
The matchup with TWC is part of SHU's barnstorming Spring Break trip -- much like early-season trips in previous years. The Saints will head on the road for matchups, in order, against Pikeville (Ky.), Alderson-Broaddus (W. Va.), Tennessee Wesleyan and Georgetown (Ky.).
