Top scorer Murray closing in on records
Growing up in the Chicago area, Kelsey Murray was able to watch the great Northwestern teams that won seven NCAA women’s lacrosse championships in eight years. She also came from an athletic family — her mother, Kristen, played lacrosse and field hockey at Brown, and her father, Todd, played basketball there as a teammate of Stanford athletic director Bernard Muir.
“I was more or less born with a stick in my hand,” said Kelsey, who was a three-time All-American at New Trier High in Winnetka, Ill.
Now a redshirt junior at Stanford, Murray easily leads
the Cardinal in goals (45) and assists (21) going into Friday’s home game against No. 8 USC in a Mountain Pacific Sports Federation showdown.
She needs four points (goals or assists) to surpass Megan Burker’s school record of 207 (2003-06). With 130 career goals, Murray stands sixth on the Stanford list, 15 behind No. 1 Sarah Flynn. Murray is No. 2 in assists with 74, 14 behind record-holder Claire Hubbard.
Since Murray still has a full year left, she figures to have every significant school scoring record by the time she leaves after five years on campus, with a degree in psychology and a master’s in communications.
She got the extra year when she tore her ACL as a sophomore. She played just four games — piling up 15 goals and nine assists — before the injury, but in a way was fortunate. Had she played a single minute of a fifth game she wouldn’t have been eligible for a medical hardship season.
“After she was injured, she was still our leading scorer for another four or five games,” head coach Amy Bokker said. “It was definitely a blow as far as goal production.”
Murray’s game is all about “building people around her,” Bokker said. “She’s a great communicator on the field. She has great vision and works very hard at her craft.”
Murray considers her “creativity’’ the strength of her game. “I wouldn’t say I play with a ton of speed,” she said. She’s right-handed, but four of her six goals in a 15-12 win over Cal on Monday were from the left side. She has scored 18 goals in her last three games.
Next year, the Pac-12 will embrace women’s lacrosse for the first time, taking five teams from the MPSF, including Stanford and Cal, and adding Arizona State.
“It’s going to be one of the most competitive conferences in the country,” Bokker said.
No West Coast lacrosse team has won the national title or even reached the Final Four. USC made the Elite Eight last year by knocking off Stanford in the first round of the NCAA tournament. It was the Trojans’ third win over Stanford last year. Murray and the Cardinal hope that streak ends Friday.