Box Score SPRINGFIELD, Mass.--The Western New England University field hockey team experienced some bad luck in a heartbreaking 3-1 loss at the hands of visiting Roger Williams University in a Commonwealth Coast Conference game at Golden Bear Stadium on Tuesday evening. The Golden Bears fall to 2-5 overall and 0-3 in the CCC, while the Hawks improve to 6-3 on the season and 3-1 in the conference.

This marked Roger Williams' first win in the series as Western New England swept the first two meetings a year ago, 2-1 in Springfield and 4-0 in Bristol, R.I.

Things started well enough for the Golden Bears who took a 1-0 lead in the 12th minute off a set piece. From the right side of the cage, freshman Michelle Carlson executed a penalty corner to the top of the circle where classmate Brittany DeLima blasted a long shot that was deflected by traffic in front and into the back of the goal.

Western New England took that one goal advantage going into the halftime break, carrying the play as the Golden Bears outshot RWU by a 9-4 count for the first 35 minutes.

But just 47 seconds into the second half, Stephanie Yaeger scored the first of her two goals to knot the score at 1-1 and received some good luck in the process. She sent a long pass into the front of the goal from the right sideline, but the ball was mistakenly steered into the open goal by a Golden Bear defender after freshman keeper Renee Rossignol thought the pass was going wide to her right. Per NCAA rules, Yeager was credited with the goal because she was the Hawks last attacking player to touch the ball (so WNE was not charged with an own goal).

Yaeger scored again 21 minutes and 10 seconds later to give RWU its first lead. Junior co-captain Katherine Ferrari thought she had made a brilliant defensive save on a close-range RWU shot, but she was whistled for a violation that gave Yaeger a penalty stroke opportunity. Yaeger came up to the spot and roofed a shot just under the crossbar into the back of the cage.

Roger Williams added an insurance goal in the 64th minute off a set piece. Katherine Mahoney scored her first goal of the season on a penalty corner pass from Abby Treweek.

Rossignol ended up with three saves while Hawks goalie Melora Lavoie made seven stops.

The game was evenly played as RWU had a 13-12 edge in shots (9-7 shots on goal in favor of WNE) and both teams had 10 penalty corners. DeLima led the Golden Bears with five shots, three on target.

Western New England's next outing will be Friday (5 p.m.) at CCC opponent Nichols College in Dudley.