Blaze took a commanding 2-0 series lead in the first ever women’s SBL Winter Box League as they overcame Ravens for the second time in a week on Sunday.
Lauren Lewis was the star of the show as her Blaze side won 9-7, scoring a hat-trick of goals, while Lucy Ford and Miho Sakurai both hit a brace, taking them to four goals for the season.
Despite a quick start, a late flurry of goals, and an attacker in red-hot form in Jane Lee, SBL Ravens fell just short once again and they’ll be looking to re-group ahead of the third game of the series on 7 January.
The game started in frenetic fashion with both sides having several shots in the opening exchanges but with three minutes gone in the tie, Lee scored her first of the game to put Ravens a goal to the good as she rifled one into the bottom left-hand corner from 15 yards out after the Blaze defence failed to close her down.
That was to be the only goal of a very entertaining first quarter in which both sides huffed and puffed but were unable to get anything else past the two goalies (Alice Loughran, Blaze, and Lucy Mayers, Ravens) who were in excellent form.
Blaze came out in the second quarter with huge intent and dominated the first few minutes, hitting shot after shot at Mayers.
But it was Ravens who snatched a goal and doubled their lead after Sofia Best’s shot bounced off the head of a Blaze defender’s stick and looped over Loughran who had moved towards the original trajectory of the ball.
Blaze stuck to their game-plan, however, and found themselves back in the game within five seconds of the restart after Lizzie Bottrill won the face-off and fed the ball into Sakurai who finished with poise.
And Blaze were level at 2-2 just a minute later when left-hander Natasha Gage picked up the ball on the far side of the pitch, cut inside, and placed her shot into the top left-hand corner.
The momentum shift didn’t worry Ravens who remained calm and regained the lead with just over six minutes left of the half when Isabel Keane cut inside from the right-hand side and fired past Loughran just as the shot-clock ran out.
If the first two quarters had been evenly-matched, the third was a fairly one-sided affair that saw Blaze execute their game-plan perfectly.
It took them 15 seconds to get themselves on level terms once again as Lewis ran onto a pass and scored to make it 3-3.
Blaze just couldn’t shake off the opposition and Ravens were back in front moments later through an incredible individual effort from defender Katya Smith who picked up the ball in the Ravens’ defensive third, shrugged off a couple of Blaze defenders, drove forward, and scored from close range.
From this moment in the third quarter, something changed in the Blaze mentality seeing them pick up the pace of the game and they were level for the fourth time in the match through Lewis’s second goal; an absolute lightning bolt hit low and hard into the bottom right-hand corner of the Ravens’ goal.
And Blaze took the lead for the first time three minutes later when Ford won a ground ball on the near-side, drove towards goal, and scored through Mayers’ legs.
Blaze completed a blistering quarter with a hat-trick goal from Lewis 30-seconds from quarter-time; they played quick through the transition, playing the ball to Lewis over on the far-side who dodged past a defender and wrong-footed the goalie to give her side a two-goal lead.
B-Oxford Blaze continued their scoring run in the fourth and final quarter as they hit three to put the game beyond Ravens.
First, Ford scored her second of the match after being fed in from behind the goal, dodging past a Ravens’ defender, and firing in from the edge of the crease.
Then, Bottrill grabbed her second straight from the restart after she won the face-off, ran towards goal and scored taking the score to 8-4.
Finally, after Lee completed her hat-trick, scoring Ravens’ fifth and sixth goals, and Laura Beaman made it into a one-goal game with a cool finish, Sakurai, who started the scoring for Blaze, scored her team’s ninth goal.
She was played in by Lewis and ripped a shot from a slight angle that flew past Mayers and sealed the win for Blaze.
The result means Blaze are now 2-0 up in the series with two games still to play.
In the other games on day 2 of the SBL Winter Box League, London Knights bounced back from their opening day defeat to Heaton Hornets by beating SBL Capitals 15-6 in the men’s competition.
Rob Harris scored an incredible six goals while England’s Ben Page-Laycock scored four to take Knights up to second in the table and leave Capitals languishing in last place.
But Heaton Hornets continued their impressive start to the 2023/24 campaign by seeing off Steelheads 16-4 to top the table going into Christmas.
Ollie Allsop, Matt Marsh, and Tom Roper all hit four goals to help their side to two wins out of two.
Watch all of the day 2 action by heading to Lacrosse Live UK’s YouTube channel HERE.
Day 2 Results
London Knights 15-6 SBL Capitals (2-0, 7-2, 3-2, 3-2)
London Knights scorers | Harris (6), Page-Laycock (4), Krommenhoek (2), Walker (2), Bracegirdle
SBL Capitals scorers | Powell (4), Perry (2)
B-Oxford Blaze 9-7 SBL Ravens (0-1, 2-2, 4-1, 3-3)
B-Oxford Blaze scorers | Lewis (3), Ford (2), Sakurai (2), Bottrill, Gage
SBL Ravens scorers | Lee (3), Beaman, Best, Keane, Smith
Heaton Hornets 16-4 Steelheads (5-1, 3-3, ?-0, ?-0)
Heaton Hornets scorers | Allsop (4), Marsh (4), Roper (4), Collins (2), Harrison, Jefferies
Steelheads scorers | Leonard (2), Di Siena, Groves
Day 3 Fixtures
12:30 | SBL Ravens v B-Oxford Blaze
14:30 | Steelheads v London Knights
16:30 | SBL Capitals v Heaton Hornets
2023 Winter Box League Men’s Table So Far…
# Team Pl. W. D. L. F. A. GD. Pts.
Heaton Hornets. 2 2 0 0 20 7 +13 6
London Knights 2 1 0 1 18 10 +8 3
Steelheads 2 1 0 1 18 22 -4. 3
SBL Capitals 2 0 0 2 12 29 -17 0