Big Red takes advantage as Quakers falter

The Penn women's lacrosse team scored the first and last goals of the game against No. 16 Cornell on Saturday, but there were 52 minutes in between that it would like to forget.

The Quakers fell 12-4 to the Big Red (6-1, 2-0 Ivy) in Ithaca, N.Y., after giving up spurts of three, four and five unanswered goals and falling behind 9-3 at the half.

But Penn (5-3, 1-1) did not roll over for its higher-ranked opponents. In fact, the stat sheet seems to tell a story of an evenly played game. The Quakers stayed close in turnovers, ground ball pickups and shots attempted, but they couldn't keep up in the most -- and perhaps only -- important category: goals.

"It really comes down to our attack and our ability to put the ball in the net," coach Karin Brower said of the team's miniscule .182 shooting percentage. "That was the difference -- finishing."

So far this season, Penn's success seems to ride on its ability to capitalize on these opportunities. While the Quakers have managed to shoot a respectable .401 in their victories thus far, they have shot at a clip of just .296 in their losses.

The attack may not have played the way they would have liked, but some of the Quakers aren't ready to pass all of the blame onto them just yet. Despite causing the same number of turnovers and clearing the ball with greater frequency than Cornell, some believe the burden of the loss falls equally hard onto the defense.

"I don't think you can really blame one side of the field more than the other," said senior midfielder Kate Parker, who picked up one ground ball and caused a pair of turnovers. "The defense needs to come up with clutch stops and give the attack the opportunity to work it around and get settled."

But in the end, the story of the game was not just what Penn did wrong: it was what Cornell did right.

The Big Red was a picture of efficiency, scoring on more than half of its shots and taking advantage of chances when they arose.

"Almost every opportunity they had, they scored," said senior midfielder Emily Cochran, who notched a goal and an assist. She added that this could have been partially a result of the Quakers' ball control problems.

However, the main difference this weekend may have come from the fact that Cornell was consistent for all 60 minutes, while the Quakers were not.

"The first half of the first half was good," Cochran said.

So if the Red and Blue wants to have any chance against No. 3 Johns Hopkins this week, it would be best served to remedy this problem -- and quick.

But, according to Brower, the solution may be simple.

"You can't win a game scoring four goals," Brower said. "You have to put the ball in the net when you have the chance.

"I don't have any magic words for you. Until we finish ,we're going to struggle."

Given the players' tough task this week, Brower is probably saving the magic words for then.

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