Three up, three down: Penn women's soccer ends nonconference slate

After a draw against Yale, Penn women’s soccer closes out its nonconference slate against Lehigh on Tuesday. Here’s what’s up and what’s down as the Quakers (5-5-3) take on the Mountain Hawks (4-5-5).

THREE UP

Juliana Provini

To be frank, she is on fire. In Penn’s last five matches, the freshman forward has scored three of the Red and Blue’s four goals, including game winners against Columbia and Loyola (Md.). Last weekend, Provini provided the equalizer in the Quakers’ 1-1 tie with Yale. She currently leads Penn in scoring with seven points on the season.

Nonconference experience

Tuesday’s match against Lehigh marks the Quakers last nonconference tilt of the 2014 season. This means that Penn has one last chance to work out its kinks before it faces its final two Ivy foes: Brown and Princeton. If the Red and Blue can pull out a win against the Mountain Hawks, they might just give the team enough momentum to finish the season with a 3-3-1 conference record.

The kids are alright

This season, Penn’s 10 goals have been netted by seven players. Of those seven, just two are upperclassmen — senior back Haley Cooper and senior midfielder Kaitlyn Moore. Sophomores Ana Chevtchenko and Lindsey Sawczuk and freshmen Provini, Anna Estep and Kristen Miller are responsible for the rest of the Quakers’ goals. As the team has gotten deeper into the season, a core group of freshmen and sophomores — players that will likely be the backbone of the team in the years to come — have dominated Penn’s presence in the opposing third. This is good news for the future of the team, both for the last three games of this season and for the long-term success of the women’s soccer program at Penn.

THREE DOWN

Fighting to the finish

In Penn’s last nine matches, seven have been decided by one goal or fewer. Thus, it is clear that the Red and Blue are battling through every game. But it seems like they can’t quite make the tables turn in their favor. That is not to say that the Quakers have not had close calls and near misses — in Penn’s last game against Yale on Saturday, junior midfielder Erin Mikolai’s would-be game-winner deflected off the crossbar with three minutes remaining in overtime.

Conference woes

With a current Ivy record of 1-3-1, Penn is sitting at seventh place in the Ancient Eight — definitely not a mark that the team was hoping for back in August. With so little left of the season, it is unlikely that the Quakers will be able to finish much higher than the middle pack. Yes, the team is young. Yes, the team is injury-ridden. But this year’s performance has been disappointing.

Too little, too late

Ultimately, it won’t matter whether or not the Red and Blue can pull off a victory over the nonconference Mountain Hawks on Tuesday because their fate within the Ivy League is all but sealed. Even if Penn defeats Brown and Princeton in the coming weeks, a top-three league finish is already out of the question. Unfortunately for the Quakers, this year’s performance is not quite up to snuff with coach Darren Ambrose’s expectation of success, which he defined back in August as perennially finishing at the top of the conference.

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