(Photo gallery)

FARMVILLE, Va. - Stephanie Roberts had her first hat trick of the season barely five minutes into the contest before finishing the day with five goals and two assists, leading a young Lancer squad to a 24-2 triumph over Howard Wednesday afternoon at Elizabeth Burger Jackson Field at the Longwood Athletics Complex.

After gutting out an 11-9 comeback victory over George Washington over the weekend, Longwood was able to turn on the cruise control in the second half as they closed the game with 21 consecutive goals.

"Although we got off to a slow start, once we got moving, I was pretty pleased with our consistency and effort," said head coach Elaine Jones, who was facing off against former Lancers and current Howard coaches Karli and Jamie Brentlinger. "The players maintained the intensity and didn't allow Howard to get many looks at goal."

A native of Baldwinsville, N.Y., Roberts led an attack that saw four Lancers net hat tricks and set career-highs all around. 

"We had been pretty stagnant on offense, so today we did a lot better of a job of constantly moving and looking for cutters and feeds," said Roberts, who set a career-high in points with her five-goal and two-assist performance.

Junior Riley Dolan scored four times and assisted on four goals setting a career-best for both categories in a single game, while fellow junior Charleigh Kondas found the back of the net five times on six shots, also a new personal-best for the Alberta, Canada, native.

"Everyone was working on moving off of each other and trying to find the open girl, so I think we did a lot of that today," Dolan said. "We had a lot of people assisting and scoring, it wasn't just one person driving."

Dolan's eight points were the most by a Lancer since a 21-7 win over Big South rival Radford in 2016 when former Lancer Katie McHugh tallied 13.

After struggling to get the offense going through the first three games of the season, the Lancers used the early momentum from a 3-0 start and fired off a season-best 44 shots with 34 coming on goal. The blue and white also flexed their muscles scooping up a season-high 29 ground balls while facing a season-low nine shots from the Bison.

Freshman Kaitlin Luccarelli, who had two goals in Saturday's home-opener, tallied a career-best four goals and won three draw controls while grabbing two ground balls.

Molly Barkman, the reigning Big South Freshman of the Week after her four assist performance on Saturday, won seven draw controls from her midfield position, just one shy of her season-high eight in the season-opener at Navy. She also added two goals and an assist.

"It was also nice to have scoring and assisting contributions from so many different attackers," Jones said.

Freshman Laura O'Toole scooped up a team-best and career-high four ground balls in just under 15 minutes between the pipes.

"I think we proved we have seven strong offensive threats and as well as having people come off the bench on fire," Dolan said.

Junior midfielder and captain Natia Warren led the Bison with her two goals and six draw controls in what was their season-opening contest.

Wednesday's win was the second-consecutive contest without Big South Conference preseason selection Madison Stair, who tallied two goals in the first two contests of the season at Navy and Lafayette.

"We have a young team on offense [without] the leadership of Madison, but a lot of people have been stepping up," Dolan said. "When she comes back, the offense will just get better."

Longwood hits the road again for back-to-back contests starting in Emmitsburg, Md. as they take on Mount St. Mary's, before clashing with Commonwealth foe James Madison. First draw is set to go up at 3 p.m. Sunday against the Mountaineers.

"We will enjoy the win today and then get started on the preparations for our next game," Jones said.

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