McMINNVILLE, Ore.  Consecutive goals from Mary Noyes lifted Whitman from its only deficit in the early minutes of Saturday's non-conference women's lacrosse neutral-site contest against Carthage (Wis.) College, and the Blues never trailed the Lady Reds again in their 13-10 victory at Linfield College's Maxwell Field.

Whitman (6-5) surrendered the first goal of the game, falling behind Carthage (5-3) on a goal by Mackenzie Day not quite three minutes into the contest.

Noyes nearly single-handedly changed the complexion of the contest, notching her 23rd goal of the season with an unassisted tally three minutes later to even the score, following with her 24th -- this time with an assist from Anna Melville -- six minutes later and then completing her three-goal run seven minutes later to lift Whitman to a 3-1 lead.

"We just played our game and didn't let that one goal get us down," reflected Noyes. "We kept our noses to the grindstone and got everyone involved. I didn't even notice the (consecutive) goals, they were just a product of our team playing its game."

Carthage finally broke the string to inch back within a goal but Ellie Teare upped the advantage back to two with an assist from Abbey Dias on Teare's sixth of the year.

Once again, though, the Lady Reds halved their deficit with a goal, but a three-goal barrage from Anna Melville provided the Blues with a 7-4 lead in the early minutes of the second half.

Melville scored a free-position goal and an unassisted marker in the final five minutes of the opening half, and then scored her 13th of the season 90 seconds into second-half action.

Carthage scored consecutive goals in response but another from Teare and two from Nina Moore pushed Whitman to its largest lead of the day, 10-5, halfway through the second.

The Lady Reds would only climb to within three goals twice in the remaining minutes, but they were never able to put in three in a row to become dangerous.

A game that turned into a bit of a high-scoring affair didn't start out that way.

Only four goals were scored in the first 20 minutes of action, a goal per five minutes rate, but the rest of the game saw the goal nets rippling at a rate of once every 2 minutes, 40 seconds.

Both teams cycled patient offenses in their attacking thirds as they softly probed the opposing defenses.

The openings each attack found were either more clear or acted upon more quickly, though, as the game gained pace.

Whitman's attack generated a 32-21 advantage in shots, and its defense accumulated nine caused turnovers -- to six by Carthage -- and a slim 17-16 edge in ground balls.

Melville, Moore and Keifer Nace were Whitman's ground-ball specialists with three apiece.

The strong afternoon of work from the Whitman defense limited Carthage's leading attackers to only five goals combined, from a trio that has accumulated 51 goals on the season coming into the game.

"That's just good defense," said senior defender Dana Casterella. "We may have frustrated them a bit," she added with a bit of a smile.

The Blues also racked up a 15-10 lead on draw controls, led by Lindsay Schwartz's five.

Noyes tied Carthage's Day for the game's top scorer with four, but Noyes also added an assist to rack up the game's only five-point day.

Kate Whittingham came up with six saves in goal to come up with her sixth win of the season.

Maggie Allen saved six each half to finish with 12 in a losing effort for the Lady Reds.

The Blues leap back into Northwest Conference competition for its final four games, beginning with home games April 8 and 9 against Pacific (Ore.) University and league leader George Fox University, respectively.