B.U. Terrierizes Stickwomen, 2-0

They say you can't win if you don't score.

And if you don't believe it, just ask the Harvard field hockey team.

The stickwomen have dropped three consecutive shutouts, most recently a 2-0 drubbing at the hands of Boston University yesterday at Soldier's Field.

But the lack of anything but a goose egg on the Harvard side of the scoreboard remains a mystery to Coach Edie Mabrey. "I just don't know. You tell me [why we're not scoring]," she said afterwards.

Well, Coach, for starters there are the injuries. Superstar Bambi Taylor was sidelined Wednesday with a sprained ankle, and forward Gia Barressi is also among the walking wounded.

"We've been forced to use a lot of new players," Mabrey explained. Co-Captain Ellen O'Neill, who is the core of what she called a "drastically changed" Crimson defense, added, "There's been no continuity from one game to the next."

But in the past three games, one thing has remained consistent: rival goalies chalking up shutouts against the non-scoring Cantabs.

A year ago, the Crimson was in a similar early-season scoreless mode, but bounced back to finish 8-6-1.

Yesterday's contest started out looking promising, especially when Harvard's Alicia Clifton came within a dog's breadth of scoring a go-ahead goal against the Terriers just seven minutes into the game.

B.U. and Harvard traded volleys during the midsection of the first half, with neither team executing any dangerous attacks.

That is, until Terrier Laura Eliseo, with about 12 minutes remaining in the half, took a hard shot off a penalty corner that Crimson goalie Kristen Abely turned away.

The rebound, however, landed on the stick of the Terriers' Diane Weinberg, who promptly fired the ball deep into the Harvard goal.

And just four minutes later. Weinberg repeated, taking a rebound that Abely had kicked out in front and turning it into an unnecessary B.U. insurance tally.

The rest of the game was the same old story for the Crimson. Harvard, led by the play of forward Andy Mainelli, put some intense pressure on the Terrier zone, but failed to convert it into anything on the scoreboard.

"The follow-up just isn't there," said Co-Captain Mainelli, the team's leading scorer. O'Neill concurred. "We're breaking down in the circle," she said.

Harvard tested B.U. goalie Mary Linehan 14 times, while the Terriers took just 11 (and only one in the second half).

Penalties

The Crimson also had six penalty corners, all unsuccessful. "Our penalty corners definitely need some work," Mainelli said of the invaluable scoring opportunities.

The main difficulty for Harvard, however, was simply the Terriers' play, especially from Eliseo, Linehan, and forward Terry Geldart, B.U., which came into the game with a 1-3-1 record (including a win over Northeastern, who beat the Crimson 1-0 on Tuesday), was extremely aggressive.

"They were very physical," complained Mainelli, who was probably most handicapped by the rough play.

"They're tough street kids," Mabrey remarked.

That toughness was exactly what Harvard lacked when it counted. "Our degree of mental toughness has not yet been acquired," O'Neill said.

And the result of that--zeroes in the scoring column and blemishes on the season record--is clearly worrisome to the stickwomen.

"It's partly bad luck," said Mainelli. "But we can't get down on ourselves--we have to look ahead fighting."

Harvard dropped below 500 with yesterday's loss, making their slate 2-3 against exclusively non-league opponents.

When the Crimson faces the highly touted University of Connecticut Wednesday, it'll be facing two challenges: to win, and simply to score.

And when you haven't scored in over three and a half hours of game time, that second challenge seems all the more important.