Pleasantville, N.Y. - An all-around victory, the Adelphi University women's lacrosse program took down undefeated Pace University on Saturday, 13-10, to return to the NCAA Division II Final Four. 

Hat tricks from Kerrin Heuser and Ashley Kolomechuck aided the offense while the defensive unit wreaked havoc on the Setter attack. Jillian McFadden notched seven important saves en route to her 18th win between the pipes. 

Down early, Adelphi was trailing 4-1 after nearly the entire first quarter. Tamia Lawson and Heuser each added a goal under the 3:26 mark to make it a one-goal game after the opening frame. Kolomechuk netted the equalizer to kick things off in the second, but Pace responded with a man-up goal following a yellow card issued to Sonny Lionetti. 

A green card in favor of the Cats saw Marielle Colalillo net her first of the game to make it five-all and Danielle Marino scored her first to give the Panthers their first advantage of the afternoon. Trading goals, the teams broke for halftime at a stalemate at 7-7.

"We fought back from the 4-1 to be tied at halftime, but we still hadn't played well," said 10-year Head Coach Pat McCabe. "We really hadn't played as well as we thought we could so we knew we just had to button up some little things and just play our game in the second half - which is what we did."

Adelphi was a perfect 8-0 in draw control victories in the first quarter and was up 13-3 at the half, due largely in part to Courtney Carollo. Two weeks ago, in the Northeast-10 Conference title game, the teams were evenly matched at this spot, but the Panthers went 23-4 in Saturday's victory.

"Last time, they [Pace] made adjustments that took us about four or five draws to counter - today we expected and waited for those things and from that point of view, strategically we felt like we had a plan," continued McCabe. "Courtney was on a mission today. You can have all the plans you want, but when a kid is that dominant, she's going to change the game... and she did."

Back-to-back yellow cards for Pace put Adelphi in a position to build a margin from the undefeated Setters - which they did as Alexandra Leggio and Kolomechuk each buried a shot within a minute of each other to lead 11-9. 

McFadden saw three saves in the ensuing minutes that came up huge, keeping Pace off the board, including a rebounded shot from Nikki Mottes. 

"Jill has been resilient - she's had stretches where she's trying to find her way a little bit and then the second half starts and she's locked in and got it all figured out," said McCabe. 

The Cats continued to press on the gas tagging two more to their side of the board to push out to a 13-9 advantage with 3:30 left in regulation. Mottes managed the final tally for Pace's 2024 season but the deficit was too great to overcome as time expired. 

Adelphi enters the Final Four as the number one seed and will take on fourth-seeded East Stroudburg. This will be the second time the two programs meet this season, with the Warriors taking an overtime victory back in March. The team will head to Winter Park Florida to participate in the Division II Festival, with semfinal games taking place on Thursday, May 23 at Showalter Stadium.