QUICK GOAL: The No. 5 SCAD women's lacrosse team will advance to the finals of the Appalachian Athletic Conference (AAC) Championship with 12-8 win over St. Andrews University on Friday.
 
FRESHMAN OF THE YEAR: Prior to the start of the Championship, the major awards and All-Conference teams were announced. Clarke Haas (Pensacola, Fla. / Fashion Marketing and Management) was named Freshman of the Year while eight other artist-athletes were named to All-Conference Teams.
 
FIRST TEAM: Sydney Bowers (Lake Worth, Fla. / Film and Television), Aly De Caro (El Dorado Hills, Calif. / Advertising and Branding), Clarke Haas, Sophia Milia (Birmingham, Mich. / Business of Beauty & Fragrance) and Katie Rowell (Waldwick, N.J. / Industrial Design). SCAD totaled the most first-team members of any team.
 
SECOND TEAM: Tatum Crouch (Easton, Md. / Fashion Marketing and Management), Tracy Richards(Poway, Calif. / Visual Effects) and Allison Thierry (Stevensville, Md. / Interior Design).
 
RECORDS:  The Bees are now 8-1 on the season while the Knights end the season with an 8-6 overall record.
 
HOW IT HAPPENED: SCAD entered the AAC Championship as the No. 2 ranked team while St. Andrews is No. 3. The Bees received a bye in the first round and faced the Knights in the semi-finals.
 
AAC Freshman of the Year, Haas got the game off to a quick start, scoring the first goal of the game less than two minutes in off an assist from Thierry.
 
Crouch gave the Bees a 2-0 lead five minutes later off an assist from De Caro.
 
St. Andrews cut the lead in half (2-1) at the 22:04 mark but goals from De Caro (assist-Milia), Haas (assist-Milia) and Milia gave SCAD a 5-1 lead with 18:58 remaining in the first half. The Knights answered with three consecutive goals to come within one (5-4) but the Bees held on to the lead, scoring four more goals – Thierry (assist-Crouch), Haas (assist-Rowell), Haas (unassisted), De Caro (assist-Jackson) – to St. Andrew's three to take a 9-7 lead into halftime.
 
Keagan Plume (Glen Arm, Md. / Architecture) opened the second half with back-to-back goals, the first assisted by Milia, to give the Bees an 11-7 lead. Haas (assist-Crouch) increased the lead to five (12-7) with 22:22 on the clock.
 
The Knights scored two minutes later but Crouch answered with a goal at the 18:31 mark to keep the five-goal lead (13-8)
 
SCAD outscored St. Andrews 5-4 in the remainder of the game to earn the 18-12 win and advance to the AAC final. Three goals came from De Caro, one assisted by Milia, one from Crouch (assist-Thierry) and one from Olivia Jackson (York, Pa. / Fashion Marketing) off an assist from Thierry to round out the scoring.
 
BOX SCORE: De Caro and Haas led the offensive charge scoring a game-high five goals each while De Caro added one assist for a game-high six points.
 
Crouch totaled three goals and two assets for five points while Milia totaled four assists and one goal for five points as well.
 
Thierry tallied three assists and one goal for four points while Plume added two goals and Jackson totaled one goal and one assist.
 
Goalie Richards tied a game-high five ground balls and nabbed a game-high 13 saves, and the win, in her 60 minutes of work.
 
De Caro totaled three ground balls while Plume and Crouch tallied five and three draw controls, respectively. Rowell and Grace Gibson (Kennesaw, Ga. / Architecture) caused two turnovers, each.
 
WHAT'S NEXT? The Bees will face AAC No. 1 Reinhardt in the Championship final on Saturday, April 17 at 12:00 p.m.