While the Penn field hockey team concluded its regular season Friday, the 3-1 loss to Princeton might not be the last time the team will see competition this season.
The Quakers (10-7, 3-4 Ivy) will learn today whether or not they earned a berth to the Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference Championship Tournament, which will be held the weekend of Nov. 15-16 at a site determined by the selection committee.
The tournament -- which includes the top four teams from the Northeast that did not make the NCAA Tournament -- usually involves at least two Ivy League schools. The only prerequisite is that each team has to have a winning record before applying for a bid.
The Quakers just so happen to have their first overall winning record since 1997 -- which is also the first and only year they made it to the ECACs, losing to Rutgers, 3-2, in the first round.
"We want another crack at some of the other Ivy teams in the ECACs," Penn coach Val Cloud said. "That's why we chose to apply and see if we make it."
After a seven-game winning streak in which Penn went undefeated against teams in the Philadelphia Six, the Quakers experienced a letdown at the end of the season, losing three of their last four games.
The Red and Blue lost heartbreakers to Ivy rivals Yale and Brown -- eliminating any chance of clinching their first combined winning record overall and in the Ivies since 1995.
"We felt we could have won those games against" Yale and Brown, senior co-captain Emily Farnesi said. "We want another chance to play them and hopefully we'll get to do that in the postseason."
The Quakers finished the season tied for fifth place in the Ivy League with Dartmouth, looking up at Brown, Yale, Harvard and Princeton.
The Big Green (6-11, 3-4) do not have a winning record, making Penn the last team in the Ancient Eight eligible for the ECACs.
The Tigers (12-5, 7-0) are already NCAA Tournament bound as league champion, but it is unclear whether Harvard (12-5, 5-2) will earn an at-large bid to the national tournament as it did a year ago.
"I don't think [Harvard] has the strength of schedule to impress the selection committee this year," Cloud said. "They also lost key Ivy League games."
The Quakers should hope their coach is wrong, for if Harvard does not make the NCAA Tournament, they will definitely receive a bid to the ECACs and decrease Penn's chances of being selected.
Last year, third-place Dartmouth and fourth-place Yale represented the Ancient Eight in the ECACs. The Elis knocked off the top-seeded Big Green, 3-1, and then went onto defeat Drexel, 1-0, to win the 2002 ECAC Championship.
This year, the Quakers hope that the selection committee will be very generous toward the Ivy League, allowing three or possibly all four teams to come out of the Ancient Eight.
"We think we have developed a lot as a team this year," Penn senior forward Marianne Rogers said. "We hope the selection committee recognizes this. We're very anxious to get another chance out there."
