NORTON, Mass. – The Wheaton College (Mass.) field hockey team was defeated by visiting Smith College, 3-1, this afternoon in New England Women's & Men's Athletic Conference season opener at Nordin Field on the Wheaton campus in Norton, Mass.
The Lyons drop to 3-3 overall and 0-1 in league play, while the Bears improve to 3-4 and 1-0.
Wheaton held a 10-9 shooting edge, but Smith held a 7-3 margin in shots on goal. The Lyons were awarded a 9-2 margin in penalty corners, but managed to capitalize on just one of them for a goal.
First year forward Ari Martinez (Provincia de Buenos Aires, Argentina) potted a pair of goals to lead Smith and sophomore forward Gia Marotta (Lynnfield, Mass.) scored for Wheaton.
Sophomore goalie Iseul Park (Ann Arbor, Mich.) made two saves for the Bears. Junior keeper Elise LeBlanc (Hampstead, N.H.) turned away two of five shots in 45 minutes of play for Wheaton, before sophomore goalie Molly Braica (New Boston, N.H.) stopped both shots she faced in the final quarter for the home team.
Smith got on the board after taking advantage of a penalty corner just 9:06 into the match to take a 1-0 edge. Junior midfielder Sam Sparling (Croton on Hudson, N.Y.) received the insert pass on the edge of the arc, before playing give and go with senior defender Ellie Szostalo (Gorham, Maine). Szostalo sent a cross back to Sparkling, who fired a shot from the edge of the arc that was tipped by first year forward Molly van Brunschot (Amsterdam, Netherlands) for a shot that skipped over LeBlanc's stick and into the back of the cage.
Martinez picked up a loose ball in the right slot and played it back to draw the Lyon keeper off her line, before Martinez flipped a back-handed shot over LeBlanc and over the goal line for a 2-0 Bears' lead with 9:19 left in the third quarter. Smith added another goal, less than seven minutes later, to pad its lead at 3-0. Martinez tallied her second marker of the game and fourth of the season after converting a penalty stroke with a shot just inside the left post with just 2:55 remaining in the period.
Wheaton cracked the scoring column, 50 seconds into the fourth quarter, to cut the deficit to 3-1. The Lyons were awarded three straight penalty corners in a span of 12 seconds and took advantage of the third corner to score their first goal of the day. Sophomore defender Carys Mitchell (Holderness, N.H.) fired a shot from the top of the arc, before senior midfielder Ally Slicer (Waterford, Maine) re-directed the shot into the air before it came down in the goal mouth. Marotta made sure the ball resulted in a score with a swipe of her stick to send the ball into the cage for her fourth goal of the year.
Wheaton will play again when it heads to Springfield, Mass. to play Western New England University at 7:00 p.m. on September 21, while the Bears return to action on September 23 when they travel to Keene, N.H. to take on Keene State College at 6:00 p.m.
