VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. - The Shenandoah University field hockey team earned a home game at the upcoming ODAC Tournament with a 5-2 win at Virginia Wesleyan Saturday afternoon.
Shenandoah (10-8, 5-3 ODAC) captured the fourth seed in the six-team ODAC Tournament with the three-goal victory over Virginia Wesleyan (7-10, 4-4).
The win means that the Marlins will return the favor to SU and make the trip to Winchester on Tuesday for a 6 p.m. ODAC Tournament quarterfinal round contest.
The winner of that game will meet top-seeded Lynchburg on Friday at 5 in the tournament semi-finals. Lynchburg, as the top seed, will host the semi-finals and finals Friday and Saturday.
Shenandoah dominated Saturday's contest, scoring the game's first three goals to take total control of the contest.
SU got its first goal just 4:53 in as Taylor Hayes set up Morgan Payne, and led 2-0 at the 28 minute mark thanks to an Elizabeth Pardo to Maddie Lamarca tally.
Payne set up Megan Stevens off of a penalty corner 9:47 into the second half with what proved to be the game-winning goal.
That tally was the first in a set of five second half goals in which the two teams traded goals.
Hayes, off of a Payne assist at 51:29, and Sarah Reed had the Shenandoah tallies. Whitney Ross set up Reed for that goal at 66:31 that provided the final margin of victory.
The Hornets outshot the Marlins 17-12 with VWC taking 11 of the game's 16 penalty corners. Shenandoah scored three goals off of its five corners.
Jessica Brown had six saves in the win.
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