via FIT web site – photo by James Regan   MELBOURNE, Fla. – The No. 6 ranked Florida Tech women’s lacrosse team cruised to a 22-7 season opening victory over No. 17 Molloy Friday evening. Lauren Tybor paced the Panthers with eight points on seven goals and one assist. The sophomore also gathered a game-high seven draw controls and five ground balls. Sara Grenier tallied five goals in the game and Mary Gormley recorded four points on two goals and two assists to go along with three ground balls and three caused turnovers. Three other players netted two goals for the Panthers. Stephanie Stuart earned the victory in the FIT cage, making seven saves while allowing seven goals to the Lions. Florida Tech finished with an advantage in shots, 41-20, ground balls, 26-25, and draws, 17-13, and forced Molloy into 34 turnovers in the game. Sam Schiano tallied the first goal of the season for the Panthers on an unassisted effort just 1:11 into the matchup. The Lions answered with a score by Nora Miller but a free position goal by Tybor just 28 seconds later earned FIT a 2-1 lead with 27:10 to go in the first half. After Jessica Markowitz evened the score at 2-2, Schiano struck again with another solo goal that kicked off a 9-0 run that gave the Panthers an 11-2 advantage at the 15:42 mark of the half. A three-goal spurt by the Lions cut the margin to seven, 11-4, with 7:50 remaining in the first stanza. However, FIT answered with three straight goals of its own, by Alexis Townsend, Tybor and Grenier, and took a 14-5 edge into halftime. Molloy netted two of the first three goals of the second half but after that it was all about the Panther offense the rest of the way. Tybor scored her sixth of the game off an assist from Caroline Dunleavy with 18:06 remaining. Grenier completed her hat trick and then added a man-up goal from Aleah Fjelstad with less than 10 minutes to go. Dunleavy notched two of the final four goals of the contest and Gormley sealed the deal in the final seconds with a score off an assist by Mollie Kaplan to give FIT the 15-goal victory. Florida Tech hits the road for a pair of top 15 matchups in the Carolinas during the weekend of Feb. 23-25. The Panthers take on No. 13 Limestone on Friday, Feb. 23 in Gaffney, South Carolina before squaring off with No. 7 Queens on Sunday in Charlotte, North Carolina.