GRANTHAM, Pa. – The fourth-seeded Arcadia University women's lacrosse team dropped a 12-2 decision to top-seeded and 16th-ranked Messiah College Thursday afternoon in the seminal round of the 2015 Commonwealth Conference Championship Tournament. The game was called with 13:43 left in the second half because of thunderstorms in the area.
 
The Falcons improved to 13-4 with the win and will face the winner of today's other semifinal match between second-seeded Stevenson University and third-seeded Lebanon Valley College in Saturday's title game. The Knights fell to 12-7 for the season and will await the announcement of the ECAC tournament field to see if their season will continue.
 
Messiah jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the opening two minutes of the game. Casey Daggett scored just 30 second in after one-timing Madi Brunk's pass from behind the net, and Marybeth Bindel followed just 30 seconds later after picking the ball up and finding open space off a near turnover inside the eight-meter arc. Claire Stikeleather then scored back-to-back goal that were both setup by passes from Brunk that came from behind the net, the first coming 1:44 into the game the second coming a minute and a half later.
 
Arcadia had a number of quality scoring chances in the first half, but a combination of near misses and three saves by Falcons' goalie Alexa Dipeso, two of which were on free position attempts, kept the Knights off the board in the first half. Junior Jessica Santoli had a shot just miss the upper-left corner in the early stages of the game, and freshman Nicole Hutson had the ball roll out of the webbing of her stick in a one-on-one situation with Dipseo that sent the shot over the crossbar.
 
Senior Haylee Molloy finally got Arcadia on the board 6:06 into the second half off a centering pass from junior Dawn Faranetta that came from the left side of the net. Faranetta then found the back of the net with 17:30 on the clock as she picked the lower right corner of the net.
 
Freshman Liz Stierle totaled six saves after entering the game 7:52 into the first half. Junior Jordyn Dunacusky got the start and allowed five goals with no saves in her eight minutes of play.