Winchester, Va. -- The chase for a four-peat lives on.

University of Lynchburg's field hockey team hit the road Thursday night looking for revenge, and the Hornets got it, toppling 19th-ranked Shenandoah, 3-1, to earn a return trip to the Old Dominion Athletic Conference tournament championship game.

Lynchburg will head to Lexington Saturday at 4:30 p.m. for the title contest against top-seeded and 11th-ranked Washington and Lee. The Hornets are in search of the program's fourth conseuctive conference crown.

Things did not look good for the visiting Hornets early. Shenandoah took an early lead on Cassidy Morrison's second-minute goal, and SU continued to pressure the Lynchburg defense in the opening minutes.

Lynchburg changed the tune of the game later in the first period. The visitors took the final four shots of the opening stanza and equalized the score with the fourth when Aaryn Boatwright chased down a loose ball by the right post and shoveled it into the cage in the 14th minute. Neither team broke through in the second, and the two Hornet squads went into halftime tied, 1-1.

Lynchburg continued the pressure early in the third and took the lead when Emma Strouse deflected a ball to Franka Weronek, who got her stick high enough to redirect the ball into the goal in the 35th minute, giving Lynchburg a 2-1 advantage.

The visitors added to the lead early in the fourth, this time when Jackie Lerro beat the defense to the right end line and chipped the ball over the goaltender for a 3-1 visiting lead.

Lynchburg kept the ball out of its own goal for the remainder of the time, snuffing out a couple of late SU penalty corners to preserve the advantage and advance to the ODAC tournament championship for the fifth consecutive season.

The Lynchburg win avenged a 4-1 loss to Shenandoah Saturday in both teams' regular-season finale.

This coming Saturday's championship game will be a chance to win Lynchburg a fourth straight league championship and the program's 22nd, more than the rest of the ODAC combined.

It will be the fourth meeting between Lynchburg and W&L in the ODAC championship. The Generals hold a 2-1 advantage in those games, but the Hornets took the latest one, a 3-1 victory this past spring to win the 2020-21 title. W&L topped Lynchburg by a 3-2 score earlier this season and holds a perfect 16-0 record this season, advancing to the title game by way of a 2-0 win over Roanoke on Thursday.

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--LYN--