The University’s field hockey team concluded their season after the first round of the NCAA Field Hockey Tournament Play-In game, falling 4-3 to the Princeton University Tigers on Wednesday, Nov. 12. at So Sweet A Cat Field.
Head coach Carli Figlio said that a great challenge of this game was prepping the team mentally to play an NCAA game, especially because they only had two days to do so.
“Making it to the next level by winning the MAAC, we’ve never done that before. I think the biggest thing was being able to move the ball through the midfield, that would have helped us a lot,” said Figlio. “But throughout the season the girls have been just absolutely brilliant. They’re a tough, great group and it’s sad that it’s over because you can’t replicate the same group that you have, but it was a really special year for us.”
Within the first ten minutes of the game, Princeton worked for three corner opportunities, capitalizing on the final corner with a goal. The goal was a rebound after freshman goalkeeper Christen Piersanti, deflected the first shot.
MU persisted, holding Princeton at midfield and advancing into their half towards the goal. The Hawks tied up the game in the 21st minute when senior forward, Trish O’Dwyer, crossed a ball from the back line to the front of the goal where freshman forward Meg Donahue was able to shoot it past the Princeton goalkeeper, earning her 11th goal of the season.
MU obtained a penalty corner eight minutes later. O’Dwyer passed the ball to freshman defender Julie Laszlo, who secured another goal for the Hawks with an outside shot and brought them to a 2-1 advantage.
With less than two minutes left in the half, Princeton received another penalty corner and capitalized it with a goal from an outside shot.
Figlio said, “It’s been a focus all year, the defensive quarter unit and they’re [Princeton] really strong. I think the ball movement from Princeton, the ball speed, definitely got a step on us. I think we knew that one of Princeton’s strengths was their attacking corners, so we were trying to be really mindful to eliminate their attacking corner opportunities. They’re very good putting the ball in the back of the net.”
The second half began tied up 2-2 with movement between both teams pushing towards goal. Momentum shifted towards the end of the half, as Princeton scored with eight minutes left and again with six minutes left off another corner.
Following the goals, MU did not let up, with two close penalty corner opportunities that almost resulted in a tie.
In the last 13 seconds of the game, junior midfielder, Cori Allen, scored off a penalty stroke, bringing the Hawks up a goal 4-3. “It’s a little nerve-wracking when you go up there. There’s a million fans and your team’s counting on you to do it, but I just stuck to my game plan and what I usually do and it worked,” said Allen.
Unfortunately for MU, they were not able to strike again and concluded their season at 13-8 with the defeat. Piersanti had two saves in the game. Each team had nine shots throughout the game, though the Hawks edged the Tigers in penalty corner opportunities, 6-5.
O’Dwyer ended her career as MU’s all-time points leader, totaling 143 points after her two assists in this game. She finished second all-time with 53 goals and first in program history with 37 assists. Senior forward Amanda Schoenfeld had a career-best of 40 points this year, with 16 goals and eight assists. In total, she finished her career as sixth all-time with 75 points from 29 goals and 17 assists.
Ending the game and the season, Allen said, “I couldn’t be more proud of the team. We went further than we ever thought and we’re making history for our program, so I think we can use that for next year and be even better.”
PHOTO COURTESY of Taylor Jackson
