ST. PAUL, Minn. - Concordia-St. Paul (2-1) opened up the Sea Foam Festival on Friday night with a 21-14 loss to Westminster (Utah) (1-1) at the Concordia Dome. It was the program's first contest against a Division II opponent. The Golden Bears will turn around on Sunday and face their second DII foe, but from the opposite side of the country as Findlay (Ohio) visits the Concordia Dome for an 11 a.m. game.

Westminster and Findlay will play in Findlay's season opener tomorrow at 12:30 prior to Hamline and Northwestern taking on Colorado College at 3 p.m. and 6 p.m., respectively.

Playing in its second Division II season and eighth overall year as a college lacrosse program, Westminster pulled out to an early 2-0 lead in the opening four minutes, the first deficit Concordia faced in program history.

But the Golden Bears responded in a hurry as freshman Maddie Hentges scored six minutes in. Just 20 seconds later, freshman Kailey Heinl tied the game, and after another 59 seconds Concordia claimed its only lead of the night at 22:41 on a goal by freshman Alina Boyce.

The trio scored 11 of Concordia's 14 goals on the night, with Heinl establishing a program record five goals, followed by Boyce with four goals and an assist and Hentges put in a pair. Boyce has scored three or more goals in each of the first three games of the year and has a team-high 10 goals on the season.

The teams played to a tie for the next four-plus minutes, a rare gap without a goal in a contest that featured 35 total goals, and it took WC over six and a half minutes to reclaim a 4-3 lead nearing the midway point of the first half (16:07).

But the Griffins would score four in a row as CSP went on a scoring drought of 11:19, the longest drought of the game for either side.

To their credit, Concordia was able to keep the game within reach, trimming the lead back to a two goal margin on Heinl's second goal on a power play with 11:22 to play, and on her third goal with 9:08 to play to make it 7-5.

Freshman Maya Hernandez delivered her first of three goals with just under four minutes to play in the half to once again cut it two (8-6).

WC scored the final two goals of the half for its largest lead, 10-6.

Concordia reclaimed momentum early in the second half as Hernandez, Hentges and Heinl each delivered goals to make it a one goal contest, 10-9 in the first five and a half minutes.

Westminster would pull away from there, scoring the next two and led by at least two goals the rest of the night. Despite falling behind by five (15-10) with just over 14 minutes left, Concordia continued to claw back and cut it to three twice, 15-12 and 16-13 the last time with just over 10 minutes to go.

The Griffons sped away at the end, scoring five in a row before Boyce scored with 11 seconds remaining.

Concordia compiled another strong shooting performance, reaching 35 shots for a third-straight game and matched a season-high 21 caused turnovers led by six from sophomore Sheala Osborne and four each from freshman Brooke Genzler and Heinl.

But Concordia committed a season-high 39 turnovers and Westminster fired 42 shots at CSP with 32 coming on net as freshman Katie Lottsfeldt made a season-high 11 saves in defeat.

Westminster was also efficient in clears at 16-19 for the game while Concordia started strong with 9-13 in the first half before 3-8 in the second (12-21 on the night).

On the draw, CSP edged WC 19-18 led by seven draw controls from Genzler, who also had three ground balls in the game. Heinl produced five draw controls and Osborne four, with Osborne adding four ground balls to Heinl's three.

Westminster was led by Kira Heiden's seven goal, one assist performance and Allison Lambert's six goal game while Morgan Bakarich had two goals and four assists. Heiden also had eight draw controls and four caused turnovers.

In the net, the Griffons used their two goalies almost equally with starter Taylor Hekking picking up the win with 32:29 of net time and eight saves to Mikala Anderson's 27:31 in net with five saves.