Higgins | Penn women's soccer searching for 90 minute effort

This season, Penn women’s soccer has alternated between the good, the bad and the ugly. As of late, however, it has been more of the ugly.

After playing conference games against Harvard and Cornell over the last two weeks, the halfway mark of Ivy League competition is fast approaching. The Quakers, though, are still winless in the Ivy League. Heading into Friday’s home match against Columbia, Penn sits at a disappointing conference record of 0-2-0 (4-3-2 overall).

The Quakers’ first Ancient Eight loss came at the hands of reigning conference champion Harvard on Sept. 27. Penn played a gritty first half, holding the Crimson and their star forward Margaret “Midge” Purce scoreless at the half.

Then, things fell apart. Led by Purce, Harvard’s front line found holes in Penn’s defense to win the match 3-0. Maybe Penn’s players just got demoralized, but it looked as if the Quaker squad in the second half was a different team than the team that played the first 45 minutes.

Last weekend’s loss to Cornell in Ithaca was more of the same. The Big Red stormed out of the gate, shocking the Quakers with a goal just 1:47 into regulation. Cornell followed up with two more goals in the first half.

After halftime, Penn regained its mojo and fought back with two goals in the second half by senior back Haley Cooper and sophomore midfielder Ana Chevtchenko. But those two goals were not enough to keep Penn’s 17-year winning streak against the Big Red alive.

In both of these games, there have been moments of brilliance from the Quaker midfield, breathtaking feints by freshman forward Natasha Davenport and gutsy saves by junior goalie Kalijah Terilli. It is clear that the Quakers have all of the makings of a great team; they just haven’t been able to fit them together for the duration of regulation play.

“We just need to compete all 90 minutes,” said sophomore midfielder Lindsay Sawczuk of what the team learned from the loss to Harvard.

Based on how Penn has played in these two games, the biggest point of improvement for the team is not getting more experience with conference foes, it’s not finessing defensive maneuvers and it’s not being more aggressive in the attack zone. While all of these things would certainly help turn Penn’s record around, the Quaker’s just need to play hard from kick off to whistle.

Monday’s 1-0 win at home against Loyola was a good start: they out-shot the Greyhounds 13-1 in the first half and kept dictating the pace of play during the second half. But the squad from Loyola is not nearly as competitive as some of the tougher Ivy League rivals Penn will face in the coming month.

If Penn wants to keep its hopes of finishing at the top of the conference, it will need to outshoot its opponents by Loyola-esque margins in both halves.

For now, Penn can only hope the confidence from Monday’s win will be enough to fuel their stamina for the entirety of Friday’s game against Columbia.

If the Quakers can take to the field for both halves with guns blazing, they should have no problem recording their first Ivy win of the season.

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