By Kyle Kandetzki and Jeffrey Werner - ASSISTANT SPORTS EDITOR AND STAFF WRITER
With two struggling teams added on to the schedule, Hofstra certainly didn’t expect their winning streak to come to a sudden halt.
The Pride field hockey team traveled to Hamden, Conn. to take on the 2-5 Quinnipiac Bobcats on Thursday, their final game before conference play begins. After their seven-game winning streak was snapped the previous week, Hofstra fell again in a rain-soaked 4-2 loss.
“We came out strong with a good game plan,” said head coach Kathy De Angelis. “But individually we didn’t persevere, and when we did try to, we came out looking very frantic.”
Earlier in the week, the Pride went up against a weak 1-6 University of New Hampshire team with hopes of tying the longest field hockey win streak in the past 11 years. But Hofstra took an unexpected 7-1 loss, leaving them with pieces to pick up going into Thursday’s contest.
The Bobcats didn’t have much offense to show for the beginning of their 2014 campaign, with only one player, senior Danielle Allan, having more than two goals. Allan, it turned out, would cause the Hofstra team the majority of their struggles.
Allan opened up the scoring in the ninth minute on an unassisted score, her fourth of the season. Whereas the Pride were unable to respond last week, the offense temporarily came alive following Allan’s score.
One minute later, Stella Schoen would silence an excited Bobcats crowd with her first score of the season. Schoen’s first goal came later than most expected following a 26-point year in 2013, but an injury kept her off the field up until this game.
In the 14th minute, Stella’s sister, freshman Simca Schoen, would take a penalty corner that would be knocked into the net by captain Jonel Boileau to give Hofstra a 2-1 advantage.
“We moved the ball much better than we did at New Hampshire,” said De Angelis. “The passing was quite nice except for some times in the attacking third.”
Then the Pride offense would come to a dead stop, with the Bobcats handling the game on both ends.
Hofstra began to unravel when Allan would continue to do more damage in the form of an assist to sophomore Lea Dietrichs’ score to tie up the game before halftime. The Pride traveled towards the net several times, but never got the ball past goalie Megan Conaboy, who had an impressive eight saves on the day.
The second half of the game could be seen as either an offensive shutdown for Hofstra, or defensive dominance by Quinnipiac. Most attacks from the Pride were stopped quickly, while the Bobcats held the ball for extended periods of time.
Hofstra continued to have trouble containing Allan as she put home her second goal of the game in the 40th minute. Sophomore Lily Shemo then scored her first college goal on a very weak shot that made its way past Pride defenders.
Hofstra only got off four shots in the second half, but didn’t take advantage of seven penalty corners on their way to the 4-2 loss.
“Statistically we should have won this game,” said De Angelis. “But some tough decisions defensively got us here.”
Following their loss against Quinnipiac, the field hockey team traveled to Syracuse, NY to take on the Orange. The rankings of each team and their records told of two different possible outcomes.
Hofstra stood at 7-3 while Syracuse stood at 6-3, 0-3 in conference play, predicting that this match was going to be close. However, the rankings told an outcome of Syracuse dominance. Syracuse is currently ranked 1th in the NCAA field hockey RPI while Hofstra is ranked 35th. No matter the rankings or records, the match promised to be a good one.
The start of the game had all the makings of a high-scoring match. Hofstra started out by putting pressure on Syracuse goalie Jess Jecko with three shots from Jonel Boileau, Carissa Witmer and Emily Gallagher within the first three minutes of the game, two of which Jecko saved.
However, it was Syracuse who struck first with a goal by Laura Hurff. It was Syracuse’s turn to put pressure on Hofstra goalie Carys Swan as they shot six times in the next 11, three of which were saved by Swan and one was scored.
From there the game went back and forth as Hofstra responded with two goals by Jonel Boileau, her seventh and eighth on the season, and Syracuse scored a third goal. The half ended as a 3-2 score in favor of Syracuse.
From the start of the second half, it was clear Syracuse was on a mission to dominate the game, and dominate the game they did. The Orange started the second half with a goal scored 4:15 in. Syracuse scored again seven minutes after the first goal of the second half.
For Hofstra, they couldn’t do much, as they only had four shots and two penalty corners. To make matters worse, Jonel Boileau received a green card, which gave her a warning, and Holly Andrews received a yellow card, which temporarily suspended her from play.
The Orange continued to show no mercy as they scored one more time to put the game away 6-2. This loss was Hofstra’s third in a row and now their record is 7-4. Fans can look forward to next game on Oct. 3rd as the Pride open their conference play at home against Northeastern University at 3:00 p.m.