BALTIMORE, MD – Abbey Hurlbrink scored a career-high five goals to lead the 22^nd-ranked Johns Hopkins women's lacrosse team to a 16-12 win over 14^th-ranked Penn State Saturday afternoon in the regular season finale. The Blue Jays improve to 8-7 overall and 4-2 in the Big Ten, while the Nittany Lions slip to 11-5 and 3-3 in the conference. JHU clinched the three seed in the Big Ten Tournament with the victory.
 
Ava Angello put the Blue Jays on the board at the 11:51-mark when she took a pass from Hurlbrink on the crease, turned and fired a shot to the bottom right corner of the goal. Penn State answered with four straight goals in a span of five minutes to storm out to a 4-1 lead with 5:58 left in the quarter. Kristin O'Neill scored back-to-back goals to kick-start the run, followed by strikes from Kara Nealon and Emma Kelly.
 
Bailey Cheetham then sparked a four-goal Blue Jay rally when she grabbed the rebound off an Ashley Bowan save and buried it at 4:26. Just 64 seconds later, Hurlbrink got free down the middle of the arc, hitched and then beat Bowan from four yards out. Charlotte Smith then took a pass from Jordan Carr, stepped down and blew home a shot from the top of the arc. Hurlbrink then capped the run when she scooped the ball up off a scramble in front and deposited it to stake Hopkins to a 5-4 lead with 39.7 ticks left on the clock. Penn State answered quickly however, as Kayla Abernathy tied the game just 26 seconds later and the teams went into the second tied at five.
 
Cheetham dodged the left alley and scored on the run to put the Blue Jays back on top just 61 seconds into the second. The Nittany Lions answered with a Brooke Hoss goal and it was a tie game with 11:35 on the clock. Hurlbrink scored off the dodge at 6:11 to ignite a 5-0 Hopkins' run that took up the remainder of the quarter. Campbell Case, Angello and Marielle McAteer all scored during the run that sent Hopkins into the half with an 11-6 lead.
 
 Hoss scored on a dodge down the middle of the arc just 1:15 into the third to pull Penn State back within four. Hopkins responded with goals from Georgie Gorelick and Smith to push out to a 13-7 lead with 7:27 to play in the quarter. Lauren Saltz got one back for PSU with a free position goal at 6:32 in what turned out to be the final goal of the quarter.
 
Hurlbrink pushed Hopkins' lead to 14-8 at 12:05 in the fourth when she went high-to-high off the dodge. Penn State battled back, scoring three unanswered to pull within three with 3:33 to play. Kelly got things going with a free position goal, followed by goals from Brooke Barger and Meghan Murray, and it was 14-11 Blue Jays. JHU ended the run when Smith found Hurlbrink wide open in the right alley and she scored to the far post to put Hopkins up 15-12. Cheetham closed out the scoring with an open-net goal with 1:33 to play.
 
Hurlbrink led all scorers with a career-high five goals and six points, she also had a career-high eight draw controls. Angello notched her fifth hat trick of the season and Cheetham had the first of her career. Case (1g, 2a) and Smith (2g, 1a) also had three-point outings for the Blue Jays. Annie Marshall had a game-high nine draw controls while Madison McPherson had three caused turnovers and three ground balls. Haleigh Moore had a game-high five ground balls and Maggie Tydings finished with 10 saves in the cage.
 
Nealon had a team-high three assists and five points for the Nittany Lions. Hoss, O'Neill and Kelly each had two goals each while Barger and Murray had two points apiece. Abernathy led the team with six draw controls and Rachel Spilker had three caused turnovers and four ground balls. Bowan finished with 19 saves, the most by a Hopkins opponent since 2013.
 
Hopkins returns to action in the Big Ten Quarterfinals on Saturday, April 29. JHU will host sixth-seeded Rutgers at Homewood Field. The time of the game is to be determined.
 
Notes: Marshall now has 75 draw controls, the third most in a season in JHU history • JHU's 22 draws are tied for the second most in a game in JHU history • This was just the sixth time that the Blue Jays had 50 shots in a game and the first time since 2013.