W. Soccer aims to buck recent trends, Bison

The Penn women's soccer team will be looking to climb back over the break-even point when it travels to Lewisburg, Pa., for tonight's 7 p.m. match against the Bison of Bucknell (4-2). The Quakers' (2-2) concentrated on ball possession and finishing off scoring opportunities in yesterday's practice. These two areas were weak in their most recent match, a 2-1 loss to Cornell Saturday. "We had a lot of opportunities which we were unable to capitalize on against Cornell," senior co-captain Heike Krippendorff said. "Hopefully [tonight] we'll be able to produce in front of the net." The defensive task for Penn will center on Bucknell striker Elizabeth Woodrow, who, though just a sophomore, has already connected for seven goals in the season's first six games. Penn coach Patrick Baker describes Woodrow as, "a good player" who "strikes the ball extremely well." "We can't give her a full chance, or even a half chance," Baker said. Penn's Jill Brown has drawn the unenviable task of marking Woodrow one-on-one, a role she also played against the star forwards of Villanova and Cornell. In both of those contests, she held her highly touted foes scoreless. These two teams met last year at Franklin Field in a match that Baker called "tough to watch" and "a dreadful experience." That day a winless Penn squad fell behind 3-0 before eventually falling by a 4-1 count. No one on the Quakers team anticipates a repeat of that. "Bucknell is not going to be expecting us to be as good as we are," said Baker, who added praise of the young midfield and front line recruits. "I think we're a new team and we can't compare to last year," co-captain Meg Kinney said. Clearly, this is an improved Penn team. The Quakers' .500 mark at this point in the campaign is a program best. The veteran defense has allowed just over one goal per game, but can expect a test versus its Patriot League opponent tonight. Bucknell has not been shut out yet this year and has hit the mark three times or more in half of its six contests. It appears that youth is central theme for this Penn team. Two freshmen have shared time in the goalkeeper spot, and only one of the Quakers' goals has been scored by a returning player, that by sophomore Darah Ross.