Kevin Sethre, Staff Writer

The Augsburg women’s lacrosse team opened their season last Sunday with a 13-11 loss to Carthage College under the dome at Edor Nelson Field.

The Lady Reds started hot, jumping out to a 3-0 lead in the first 6:19 of the first half, but the Auggies quickly tied it with goals from Megan Furlong, Annika Hegrenes and Mikayla Knudson. It was back-and-forth for the rest of the game, with neither team having more than a two-goal lead. Augsburg went into the half leading 7-6 and was ahead 11-10 before allowing three goals over a 3:46 span to fall behind for good.

Hegrenes was impressive despite the loss, scoring a game-leading, and career high five goals as well as contributing an assist for the Auggies. Knudson and Tess Ryan also added two goals each. Despite being outshot 41-17, Augsburg kept the game close thanks to an outstanding performance in goal from Maddie Seykora. She tied her career-best with 20 saves and also recorded two caused turnovers and four ground balls. Additionally, 11 of the 14 shots on goal by the Auggies found the back of the net. 

Augsburg hopes to build on last year’s success, when they finished with a 10-3 record in conference games, which was good for the fourth and final playoff spot in the Midwest Women’s Lacrosse Conference. They will certainly hope to improve on their postseason performance, as they lost 14-2 to Hamline in the first round of the playoffs.

This weekend, the Auggies open up conference play with a visit to Loras College on Saturday and Monmouth College on Sunday.