MANCHESTER, N.H. – Despite six goals by sophomore midfielder Kelsey Howard (Scarborough, Maine/Scarborough), Bentley University was knocked out of the Northeast-10 Women's Lacrosse Championships by Saint Anselm 17-10 in the first round on Wednesday afternoon.

The third-seeded Hawks improve their record to 13-3 and advance to the semifinals on Saturday where they will meet second-seeded New Haven. Sixth-seeded Bentley's season comes to a close with an 8-9 record.

Two straight goals by Howard early in the second half and Bentley trailed just 10-9 with 23:20 remaining in the game. But five straight goals by the Hawks turned out to be the decisive run, giving them a 15-9 lead with 13:20 remaining. The run was started with two goals just 20 seconds apart from Erin Marshall and Kaitlyn Stazinski and finished with a strike by Kelly Pickett.

Howard scored her sixth of the afternoon on a free-position shot with 8:31 to go, making the score 15-10, but that was the last time the Falcons scored.

The Hawks jumped out to a 5-1 lead after just over seven minutes of action in the first half. But the Falcons responded with a 5-1 run of their own, which knotted the game 6-6 with 11:29 left in the half. Erin O'Connor (Longmeadow, Mass./Longmeadow), Carolyn Kynoch (Ashland, Mass./Ashland) and Taylor Bastien (North Kingstown, R.I./North Kingstown) had three straight goals. After Saint Anselm's Caitlin Villareal scored, Howard found the back of the net twice in a row.

Saint Anselm responded with three straight goals to take a 9-6 advantage, only for Howard to net her third of the half with 4:23 left, the final goal of the opening 30 minutes, and Bentley trailed just 9-7 at halftime.