Field
Hockey Takes Two to OT
By Blake Wilder Twice
it came down to the wire and the Yeowomen still need to iron out
the details in their game. The Oberlin College field hockey team
played two home games into overtime and came away with a win and
a loss.
The Yeowomen defeated Kenyon, 1-0, on Saturday, but were unable
to keep the momentum up as they lost 2-1 to Denison on Tuesday,
dropping their record to 4-3 overall and 3-3 for the conference.
The field hockey team has overcome the disadvantages of a young
team and a small bench and continues to display excellent play around
the field, but small inconsistencies and the inability to finish
off the attack has left them with the bitter taste of coming close
but not close enough.
Saturday’s game combined intensity and good individual play
to keep it competitive the entire way through.
Junior Jaime Johnson and senior Chaney Stewman repeatedly combined
on the right side to allow Oberlin to get into the attacking 25
and put pressure on Kenyon’s goalie. Senior Briana Quinn also
added to the Yeowomen’s attacking prowess by managing to thread
some long balls to the forwards from the back.
In the back Senior Christina Congelton calmly broke up Kenyon breakaways
on more than one occasion.
“[Congelton] had a really nice game Saturday against Kenyon,”
head coach Deb Ranieri said. “She handled the ball well.”
The game moved at an exhausting pace as play changed ends pretty
regularly through regulation time, but neither team could manage
to score and the game went into overtime.
The first period of overtime looked a lot like the rest of the game
with lots of breaks and no scoring. As the overtime continued, Oberlin
began to appear the better team, as Kenyon’s possessions grew
shorter and sloppier. At the end of 15 minutes the score was still
tied at 0-0, and the teams took another break.
In the second extra-time period the Yeowomen came out and scored
in under a minute. First-year Meg Reitz put the ball in the cage.
The team looked slightly less impressive against the College of
Wooster on Tuesday. A defensive slip in the first half allowed Wooster
to capitalize on a turnover as Oberlin could only manage to get
four defenders back. Wooster pressed five forwards and used the
man advantage to create the opportunity to score.
At the break Wooster still led by one, but the second half looked
more like the impressive play from Saturday as the Yeowomen came
out strong. Oberlin had good possession in the attacking 25 for
most of the half and twice as many corners as in the first half.
All their pressure paid off as they managed to equalize the score
with a goal from senior Nana Uemura.
Once again the Yeowomen went into overtime in search of a decision.
Again it seemed like it would not come, but in the closing minute
of the first extra time period Wooster managed to steal the victory
with another goal.
“We played a good game,” Ranieri said. “It’s
disappointing that we lost because once again I think we were the
better skilled team.”
The
team has been seeing some standout individual performances. “[First-year]
Christine Castilla is really stepping up for us. She’s been
significant in the last two games,” Ranieri said. Castilla
usually plays defender but has seen time in the midfield and on
the attack. “She’s been very versatile,” Ranieri
added.
She’s not the only one. On the defensive side the team has
benefited from good performances from Congelton and first-year goalie
Siv Tang. On the other end Stewman and Johnson have been adding
an offensive threat.
“[Johnson] has been really aggressive in the midfield and
coming up and creating fouls causing us to get possession,”
Ranieri said.
Unfortunately, the team has not been able to master the consistency
needed to win games.
“We have a nice interception and we get the ball past the
defender and then sometimes we’ll have a bad shot or we’ll
have a bad pass,” Ranieri said.
However, the team still has over half their schedule to play and
plenty of time to improve further.
“In
these past couple of games I feel like we have been meshing together
as a team a lot more. I think that’s because we are more familiar
with our positions individually and then everyone else on the team,”
Johnson said. “Since it’s such a young team it took
us a while to get used to everyone’s style of play. Definitely
we’ve been passing a lot more and that’s really important
to win games.”
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