LOWELL, Mass. – In a wild match that featured seven goals and five coming in the second half, it was the hat trick of Gabby Diodati that stole the show and gave the Fairfield University Women's Soccer team a well-deserved 4-3 victory over UMass Lowell. Diodati's first career hat trick featured the first three goals, with the game-winning score coming from Kayla Leary, her first collegiate goal.
 
"I think it was a great response from us tonight," Head Coach David Barrett said. "We've got good players who can play good soccer and this was a good team effort tonight. We challenged our players to be more aggressive going forward and take risks when it made sense to and I think we did that. I'm really proud of the character we showed tonight and it was an important step in the process."
 
The Stags set the tone early with that aggressive offensive tempo in the first half. Fairfield was the first team on the board when Diodati connected with the first of her three goals in the match as she curled in a corner kick off the hands of the goalkeeper in the 30th minute.
 
That lead would last just nine minutes after the Stags were called for a handball in the box setting up a penalty kick opportunity that Ioanna Papatheodorou converted.
 
The 1-1 score would last until the second half as the excitement started to build. The final 45 minutes featured five scores, with four of those in a four minute span. Diodati opened the second half scoring as she was in the right place after a shot by Lexi Lehan went off the crossbar and Diodati was able to hit in the rebound for a 2-1 lead. Lehan was credited with the assist, her first collegiate point.
 
The flurry of goals would start 20 minutes later and again it was Diodati at the forefront. Caroline Kelly sent a long looped ball over to the side of the box where Diodati was able to get a free header to and put in the back of the net. That completed the first career hat trick for Diodati and gave her 13 career goals.
 
The River Hawks responded with two goals in a 1:30 span. After surrendering the two goal lead, the Stags answered right back in the 79th minute. Brooke Hernon sent a corner kick over towards goal which was punched out the goalkeeper and the loose ball found the right foot of Kayla Leary. The defender was able to blast the ball into the net, providing what would be the game-winner. It was the first collegiate score for Leary.
 
In total, the Stags sent 11 shots on target, with six coming in the second half. Gena Pike collected three saves, including a key stop with five minutes remaining to keep the lead.
 
The Stags are back in action at home on Thursday night when they welcome Holy Cross to Lessing Field at 6pm.