Field hockey opens A-10 play with 2-0 win

The Saint Joseph’s University field hockey team (5-3, 1-0) opened Atlantic 10 play on Sunday with a victory against LaSalle University. Not only did the win break a two-game losing streak for the Hawks, but it also allowed them to open conference play on a positive note, according to Head Coach Lynn Farquhar.

“Today is huge. It’s conference,” Farquhar said. “Every year you have a new group. I know that 50 percent of our squad is new this year, so we’re going to take two steps forward, but we’re going to take steps backwards every now and then. Our goal was to move on from it and we did that in our first conference match. All of our A-10 opponents are strong, so we have to be ready to go.”

After a scoreless first half, junior Jacqueline Pauling hit the back of the cage for her second goal of the season. It’s the third consecutive season that Pauling has scored against LaSalle.

“I don’t know. I guess its just coincidence,” Pauling said. “You know, it’s an A-10 team, another Philly team, so it’s always going to be a good game with them.”

Less than two minutes later, the Hawks struck again. Freshman Doris Offerhaus scored on an assist from fellow freshman Pepa Serrano to give St. Joe’s a 2-0 lead, where the score would remain until the final buzzer. Serrano’s assist was her fourth this season, which puts her just one behind the conference leader. senior Izzie Delario of the University of Massachusetts.

Farquhar claimed no major halftime adjustments were made to inspire the two goals.

“I would love to take credit, but no, we just trusted the process,” Farquhar said. “We continued to do our plan and wanted to stay sharp and had to trust that they would fall into place.”

The Hawks benefited from a bounty of opportunities throughout the game. St. Joe’s took 25 shots (14 on goal) on Sunday to LaSalle’s three shots (one on goal). St. Joe’s also outnumbered LaSalle in penalty corners, 11-2. Pauling attributes this advantage to her squad’s patience.

“We really just focused on just trusting each other and playing as a unit this game,” Pauling said. “We just talked about how it’s easy for teams to get frustrated with so many shots, but we just kept working with each other and knew that eventually it was going to go our way.”

Farquhar was pleased with the way the team played on Sunday.

“[We played] good,” Farquhar said. “Again, I think it’s about the little pieces for us. We wanted to play as one and let the ball do the work. I really think that was our goal and we stayed on the gameplan and although we’d like to score earlier and everybody wants to score more, they came and we did what we needed to do.”

Pauling added to her coach’s comments about the significance of Sunday’s win.

“It’s important as the first A-10 game to make a statement and just continue to grow from this game,”Pauling said.

The team will travel to Saint Louis University on Friday before returning home to host the 17th-ranked University at Albany.

Farquhar emphasized the mentality of one game at a time.

“First is Saint Louis, but we’ll hope to take care of them,” Farquhar said. “That’s going to be tough because it’s on the road. Then we’ll come back. Yeah, Albany’s talented, but we’ll get to them after Saint Louis.”

LaSalle and St. Joe’s will face off again in a non-conference matchup on Oct. 7 at Ellen Ryan Field.