After starting the season so well against Ohio State and Stanford, the women's lacrosse team has faltered against tougher Ivy league competition. Fresh off a 16-5 defeat at the hands of nationally ranked Yale, the Red and Blue (3-4, 1-2 Ivy League) have a good chance at stopping their recent skid against Harvard Saturday at Franklin Field at 11 a.m. The Crimson (3-4, 1-1) have already recorded as many Ivy League wins as they had all of last season. Plus, three of Harvard's four losses have been by two goals or less, including a double overtime loss to the University of Massachusetts. "We haven't played as well as we would like lately," Penn co-captain Darah Ross said. "We knew we would be overmatched by Yale but we still played below our capabilities. We need to get back to doing the basics correctly -- like stick-handling, passing and running our sets." Ross has rarely been lacking on offense. Just seven games into the season, she already has three six-goal outings and 22 total scores. Co-captain Emily Hansel has also contributed a valuable 13 scores, but the Quakers have not been able to stand up to their nationally ranked opponents, including Yale, Loyola (Md.) and Temple. "Our competition has been tough, but we should be comfortable playing a hard schedule," Hansel said. "We are a very competitive team ourselves and right now, we are not where we would like to be. But it is still early in our season. Coach [Sage] has made us focus on passing and executing better and those are the things that need to be done well to beat the better teams." Harvard will probably not be one of the better teams on the Quakers' schedule, but the same principles should apply for a Penn victory. "We haven't really discussed Harvard that much because of Yale," Hansel said. "It's going to be a home game and we're going to be ready for it. We have some trouble getting psyched up for road games." In their last five games, the Red and Blue have allowed just under 14 goals per game. Not surprisingly, the Quakers went 1-4 in that five-game stretch with the only win being an 11-5 decision over Columbia. Another key to the Quakers' season has been putting together strings of goals. In a game where momentum plays such a major role, the Quakers must find a way to close out teams when things seem to be going in their favor. If they are on the downside of the pendulum, however, the Red and Blue cannot afford to play tentatively or they might find the game put out of its reach. "Our defense has played well for most of the time in every game, but we have lost due to brief stretches when the other team scores three or four goals in a row. It's hard to keep quality teams out of the net but if we don't start doing it, we will keep recording losses," Ross said. The move back to the home field will be an advantage for a strategic reason as well. Playing at Yale, in Yale Bowl, the Quakers had to make the moves on natural grass. But the playing surface of Franklin Field should heavily favor Penn's game. "The turf will definitely be an advantage for us," Hansel said. "We would like to dictate the pace of the game." The best strategy would be to go back to the plays diagrammed in practice and try to run them as accurately as possible. And if that does not work, perhaps the Quakers should look into installing longer halftime breaks, because Sage will certainly have a lot to discuss.
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