Whew! It was game that had a lot of tension and hard playing. The officials left their cards in their pockets and both teams let it all hang out. But it was the Leopards who prevailed in the end, as they were not going to be denied a happy bus ride back to Easton. This was one of those “character” games as these athletes left it all on the field.
Yesterday I wrote, “Desperate teams can be dangerous teams,” which ended to be a prescient vision. The game started out with the Leopards on attack and one thought as we watched, it was only a matter of time before a flood of goals was to be posted in Lafayette’s favor. The Leopards, in the first period, got off 6 shots to Quinnipiac’s one, but each Leopard shot was not to find the back of the cage as fans became more anxious.
In addition, Lafayette had three corners in that half, which were to be the only corners of the game. Each of the corners, whether it was Quinnipiac’s intense defense or Lafayette errors, fell short without getting a decent shot on goal. Typically, in games like these it was the opponent who finds an opening and draws first blood. Such was the case, as in the Bobcats first and only shot of the period by Felicia Costanzo came as she drove the baseline and managed to find an angle to the back of cage.
Although the second period was devoid of corners, it was filled with opportunities for both teams to get off five shots. The hard play continued, typical of the action was a hard stick to the leg of Ellen Colbourne which drew some blood and had to be attended to by the expert hands of the Lafayette trainer. She was helped off the field by her teammates only to return later in the game.
The tying Lafayette goal could have come in no better fashion than it did. Several times forward Rosa Jonckheer was to be denied a goal by the hard aggressive efforts of the Bobcat defense. Inevitably, Adriana Pero was to find Rosa near the top of the circle where the freshman attacker was to put on a schooling of “broken field field hockey skills” placing her one on one with the Bobcat goalie. It ended in a hard shot whose welcome bang at 63:47 was to delight the faithful in the stands.
Quinnipiac was to get one more shot before the end of the period. Goalie Katelyn Arnold was to come up big on several occasions during regulation time making it possible for Jonckheer to deliver her heroics near the end.
Overtime was just as hard fought as it looked like there was to be a second overtime period. The seven aside period was to start with Colbourne, Lillis,van der Geest,Arnold, Jonckheer, Magadan, and Turner on the field as Coach Stone tried to have the right combination of speed and skill to end the contest.But it was freshman Cameron Costello having subbed in for Rosie Shanks, who was to team up with senior Ami Turner delivering the crossing pass, ending the game almost eleven minutes into the overtime period. It was Cameron’s first goal of her career and it couldn’t have been more needed.
This was one of those games that can define a season, a hard physical affair, against a determined, dangerous team played all out, from end line to end line….a character game!!
Lafayette College Field Hockey 