Box Score NORTHAMPTON, Mass. - On a historic night for the Smith field hockey program, the Pioneers advanced to the semifinals of the New England Men's and Women's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) field hockey tournament with their 5-0 shutout win over Springfield College Tuesday night.
Smith improves to 11-8 on the season and defeats Springfield (10-9) for just the second time in program hisory. This was also the Pride's first loss since October 17, a span of five games.
The Pioneers will take on No. 2 seed Wellesley College Saturday at 3:00 p.m. hosted by Babson. Live stats and video will be available.
Casey Rau (Pottstown, Pa./Owen J. Roberts) got things started right off the bat for Smith as she took a pass from
Beatrice Chaudoin (Millersville, MD/Severna Park) at the top of the circle and drilled the ball to back of the net for her first goal of the year just 1:23 into the contest.
"We scored in the first minute on a corner so I think that really pumped the team up and got the energy flowing," said senior captain
Casey Rau (Pottstown, Pa./Owen J. Roberts). "We noticed we scored off a corner so for the next half we tried to keep getting corners and keep them on their toes."
Both teams were held scoreless for the remainder of the period. The Pride outshot Smith 5-2 in the first half and corners were even at one apiece.
The game was a tale of two halves as the Pioneers offense exploded for four second-half goals.
Smith would take advantage of a 10 minute yellow card from Springfield to score two goals on their man-up situation.
Julia Hamilton (Williamstown, Mass./Deerfield Academy) notched her 10th goal of the season in the 47th minute when she collected the rebound off a save from the Pride netminder to give Smith a 2-0 lead and
Mariah Ollive (Milton, Vt./Milton) found the back of the net on another successful corner opportunity.
Elsie Odhiambo (Oyugis, Kenya/Kisumu Girls School) got in on the scoring as she coralled a loose ball to beat the opposing keeper and put the game out of reach at 4-0 with 11:26 left to play.
Hamilton netted her team-leading 11th goal of the season on a beautiful reverse sweep from the center of the circle to seal the win.
Cameo Tietje (Massapequa, N.Y./Massapequa) made five saves to record her third shutout of the season. Timarie Villa stopped five shots in the loss.
"I think the team played great; we were really hungry to show Springfield what kind of a game we play and we utilized our passing and played our game," said head coach
Jaime Ginsberg. "It was amazing to have this many people on the sidelines filling the hill. The community really supported the game and the energy that came from the crowd we could feel it."
Tonight was the first playoff win for the Pioneers dating back to the 2000 season and the first win over Springfield in the playoffs in five meetings. Smith's five goals was the most scored in a NEWMAC playoff game and was their largest margin of victory in the conference tournament. The Pioneers last scored five goals in the postseason as a member of the NEW 8 conference in 1990 and had a six goal margin of victory againt Mount Holyoke 1989 in the NEW 8 semifinals.