It's taken a season-long journey and opportunities on the biggest of stages for Janine Hillier to finally find her shot.
But after a career-high-tying four-goal performance in No. 4 seed Florida’s 13-11 first round win over No. 13-seeded Stanford in the NCAA Women's Lacrosse Tournament, her teammates didn’t seem to mind the wait.
"She's had some struggles in the past with getting those shots on goal," sophomore Kitty Cullen said. "I mean she's a great, talented player. She's athletic, she's fast and now her getting by her defenders is just helping us so much, especially going into the rest of the NCAA games."
Over her last two games, Hillier has scored seven goals for Florida (16-3) - a stark cry from the way she started her season.
Hillier's season began with a goalless showing on seven shots against then-No. 3 North Carolina. A week later at Jacksonville, she was 2-for-7 while hitting only 15 percent of her attempts.
But after a rain delay of more than three hours Saturday, the midfielder couldn't be stopped in the Gators first NCAA Tournament victory.
"I truly believe in the saying that hard work pays off," Hillier said. "Just with the help of your teammates, especially just having such great chemistry on offense it's just rubbing off on each player."
Scoring on 50 percent of her shots, Hillier reclaimed the lead twice for the Gators on two-goals runs against the Cardinal (16-3).
She gave Florida a 5-4 lead with just 13 seconds left in the first half. Then, she put away two straight goals to snap a 10-10 tie with 13:04 remaining in the game - a lead the Gators would not relinquish.
"When we lost the lead, they certainly could've put their heads down and said that's it," coach Amanda O'Leary said. "But they fought hard and they fought back, and I think that's a sign of maturity and I'm just so thrilled for these guys."
To go along with Hillier's big game, the Gators also got four goals from Cullen and a hat trick from Brittany Dashiell.
With Stanford's full-field press and willingness to defend even in the space behind the goal, Florida's second-leading scorer Ashley Bruns was largely ineffective. The sophomore registered just one shot for the entire game. O'Leary said Stanford's defense threw the Gators' offense out of whack before halftime and opened up space in the offense for Hillier.
"The more threats you have offensively, the better you're going to be. If they shut down Ashley, we have six other threats," O'Leary said. "That's the great thing about our team is that we're not one-dimensional."
Florida will play the winner of No. 5 seed Duke and No. 14 seed Penn next weekend in Gainesville with an NCAA semifinal berth on the line.
