Claremont, Calif. - The Pomona-Pitzer Women's Lacrosse team avenged its only SCIAC loss of the season by taking an 11-8 road win at Claremont-Mudd-Scripps on Wednesday evening, clinching the top seed in the conference tournament, which begins next week. 

Junior Sarah Markowitz (pictured) and freshman Sallie Marx each had three goals for the Sagehens, who improve to 11-3 overall and 8-1 in the SCIAC, giving them a three-game lead over the rest of the conference for first place with one game left to play. CMS is now 8-5 overall and 5-4 in the SCIAC, putting it in a three-way tie for second place with Occidental and Redlands. 

The game was back and forth most of the way, until the Sagehens closed out on a 5-1 run over the final 25 minutes. Markowitz scored with one second left in the first half to give Pomona-Pitzer a 5-4 lead and Marx opened the second half with her third to make the score 6-4. CMS responded, though, with three goals in a span of 2:06 to take a 7-6 lead with 25:54 left after two straight goals from Lauren Clubb. 

Sophomore Hannah Christenson brought the Sagehens back even with 20:13 left, and junior Ally McLaughlin gave Pomona-Pitzer the lead for good with 16:34 to go on a feed from junior Aubrey Douglass. Markowitz scored her second to make the score 9-7, and after CMS scored to pull within 9-8, Markowitz restored the two goal lead with 6:32 left, and sophomore Rebecca Long helped seal it off a feed from Douglass with 4:11 to go to give the Sagehens their largest lead of the night. 

Sophomore goalie Gaby Fukumura ended any CMS comeback hopes when she saved a free position shot with just under a minute to play, her sixth save of the game. 

With its three-game lead, Pomona-Pitzer can actually clinch the 2015 SCIAC championship without needing to win the conference tournament. The conference winner is determined by a combination of regular season and postseason wins, and the three-game lead (and opening round bye) would put the Sagehens in a position where merely advancing to the final would be enough to win the SCIAC.