The Penn women’s soccer team traveled to Morgantown, W. Va. Friday seeking its first NCAA tournament victory in program history.
But the Quakers will have to wait at least one more year.
In the 71st minute, Penn State’s Tani Costa — leading scorer during the Nittany Lions’ regular season — scored a goal off a pass from senior forward Danielle Toney.
That proved to make the difference for the Nittany Lions, as Penn was unable to equalize and suffered a 1-0 loss.
“I told [the team] not to let the result cloud their performance,” Penn coach Darren Ambrose said. “I thought we played extremely well.”
Competing against a high-powered Penn State offense, the Quakers defended well for most of the game. Junior midfielder Adrienne Lerner shut down her former club teammate Christine Nairn, while Sarah Friedman defended and distributed well from the midfield.
Still, Costa’s goal was the result of a great individual play by Toney, who broke free of a Penn defender to the endline and laid the ball back across the goalmouth for Costa.
Even on offense, Penn was hardly the inferior team. With the exception of the game’s initial minutes, the Quakers were able to create chances throughout the match.
Two of Penn’s best opportunities came for senior Kristin Kaiser in the second half. The forward was on the receiving end of two beautiful through passes from the midfield but could not hit the back of the net.
For seniors Friedman, Kaiser, Kaitlin Campbell and Marisa Schoen, the game was the last of their collegiate careers.
“I wanted one more game with them,” Ambrose said. “They’ve been a joy to work with, and I’m really proud of what they’ve accomplished.”
Junior Caroline Williams had another strong showing for the Quakers in goal, stopping four shots and a couple of dynamite opportunities.
Despite the loss, the Quakers can still look back on a season in which they overcame injuries and early losses to win the Ivy League title.
“I think this team raised the bar for our program,” Ambrose said. “They rode out a lot of storms on and off the field as a team.”
Lerner, for her part, is already looking ahead to next year.
“As a junior, my class has something to play for next year and a little bit of redemption to get back to what we did this year and go even further,” she said.
