The 10-0 Penn women's lacrosse team wasn't always at the top of the Ivy League.
In fact, in coach Karin Brower's 10 years with the program, the Quakers have only beaten Ivy League rival Dartmouth twice - in each of the last two seasons.
So tomorrow at noon on Franklin Field, Brower will look to keep the streak alive.
No. 13 Dartmouth (6-3, 3-0 Ivy) finished second in the finals behind Northwestern in 2006, just like the Quakers did last season. But in the past two seasons, it's been the No. 2 Quakers (10-0, 4-0) that have emerged as the Ivy League champions and gotten a bid to the national tournament.
"They have kids that went to that program because it was a top program," Brower said. "They are trying to build them up and get them back to that Final Four."
The Quakers are well aware of what the Big Green are out to accomplish. When they take the field tomorrow, it will have been three weeks since the Red and Blue faced a fellow top 25 team.
The Big Green had a bit of a rough spot this season, losing three straight games to unranked Massachusetts, then-No. 11 Notre Dame and then-No. 2 Maryland in overtime. But Brower feels that these losses earlier in the season are not representative of the squad that the Quakers will be seeing tomorrow, especially since Dartmouth is now on a four-game winning streak.
"They've gained a lot of confidence in the last couple games and are really taking it to their opponents," Brower said. "We're going to have our work cut out for us."
Because they are a young team, the Big Green have taken immense strides over the course of this season alone, defeating fellow Ivy League rival and then-No. 19 Cornell last weekend.
"It's good for us to play those types of teams, because we need to keep our level of play high," Penn senior attack Becca Edwards said of Dartmouth.
According to Brower, her squad will face a "typical Dartmouth team" - one that is speedy, scrappy and likes to push the fast break.
The two offensive threats that are on the Quakers' radar are Dartmouth sophomore attack Kat Collins and sophomore midfield Greta Meyers. Collins has netted 27 goals so far this season, 10 more than any of her teammates. Meyers has 17 goals on the season, but she has also managed to cause 14 turnovers as well, making her an asset on both sides of the ball.
The Quakers will have their best defenders, Hilary Renna and Emma Spiro, match up against these two Dartmouth scorers. A problem area for the Red and Blue may be the height difference between the 5-foot-11 Collins and the approximately 5-3 Renna.
"Hilary is strong and she's solid, so she's small but good," Brower said. "But that will be an interesting size match up, and we'll try to see how that one goes."
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