This year's Penn field hockey team has consistently found a way to bounce back from defeat.
After losing in the final minute to Lafayette during the fourth game of the season, the Quakers rallied to shut out Ivy rival Cornell in their next game, 3-0.
After falling two games under .500 six games into the season, the Red and Blue fired off seven straight wins.
And after losing a heartbreaker to Yale this Sunday, the Quakers returned to their winning streak with a 2-0 victory over West Chester, clinching Penn's first 10-win season since 1997.
"This will be a big game for us heading into our last two Ivy League matchups," Penn coach Val Cloud said before yesterday's game. "We want to keep our momentum going into Brown and Princeton."
The Quakers (10-5, 3-2 Ivy) responded to their coach's statement with a dominating defensive performance in which the Golden Rams (5-12) were held to just two shots for the entire contest.
Unlike the Yale game -- in which Penn's defense gave up eight corners -- the Quakers only gave up three corners and were able to clear the ball almost every time against a much weaker West Chester offense.
"I think we went in with the mentality that we didn't want to give up many corners," senior co-captain Emily Farnesi said. "We wanted to keep the ball outside the circle."
The Quakers got on the board early when sophomore Cara Calahan scored off an assist from senior Marianne Rogers just 6:12 into the game.
Junior Liz Lorelli basically put the game out of reach when she tallied her 17th goal of the season with 12 minutes remaining in the first half.
Lorelli's goal established her as the new all-time leader at Penn for points in a season (37). The Ivy League leader in offense is set to finish first in the league in both goals and points this season.
"When we get the ball across the halfway point of the field, we're awesome," sophomore Kristen Gray said. "We keep getting it down, like around the circle, and finding a way to score."
Freshman goalie Elizabeth Schlossberg played the entire game but only had to make one save, as the West Chester offense was kept off-balance by the Quakers' defenders for much of the game.
"They didn't really make good connective passes," freshman defender Melina Tsui said. "We definitely stepped up our physical roughness because we had heard they were an aggressive team."
Tsui was one of six substitutes who received playing time yesterday, especially during the second half, as the Quakers rested most of their starters.
Freshmen Tracy Statter and Nyssa Liebermann, juniors Samantha Somach and Rosemary Connors and senior Courtney Blenheim also contributed to Penn's victory.
"It's good when everyone gets a chance to play," Cloud said. "We want to have games like Columbia and like this to give girls who haven't been playing much some time out there."
Penn's starting lineup is expected to be back in full force, however, as the Red and Blue try to clinch a winning season in the Ancient Eight at Brown on Saturday.
"We want to have the same defensive performance at Brown that we did today," Farnesi said. "All the girls really played well --it was a solid team effort."
