Head coach Kelly Blasius-Knudsen '91 and her Dartmouth women's soccer team did something to her former squad, the University of Vermont, that no other team has been able to do this year: play them to a draw. The Big Green and the Catamounts played 120 minutes of scoreless soccer at Chase Field yesterday pushing the Green's record to 6-4-2 and the Catamounts's to 6-6-1.
The Big Green is now 5-0-2 against the Catamounts in their last seven games, not allowing them to score a goal in the last four of those games.
The game was dominated by missed opportunities, but the Green definitely dominated the majority of play, keeping the ball in the Vermont end and taking numerous shots on goal, only to be turned away time and time again by Catamount goalkeeper Eileen Narcotta who recorded ten saves.
Narcotta, though, was outshined at times by the stellar play of Kristin Luckenbill '01 between the Dartmouth pipes. Her seventh shutout of the season pushed her goals against average to 0.45 and into the top five in the nation, but she certainly was not satisfied with the final score. It showed in her demeanor after the game.
"I'll try to be positive," she said. "But I'm a little pissed off." Luckenbill went on to describe the game as "frustrating."
"Our shots went everywhere but on target, over the top, left, right," Luckenbill said.
"A draw with UVM is really a loss for us and a win for them. We are better than them and they know it. We just did not prove it today,"
Although the Big Green had more opportunities, it was a game that either team could have won or lost, had a near miss found the back of the net.
Vermont's best chance of the day came at 76:40 when referee Roland Gagnon called a trip that may have been intended to atone for a wrong call made in favor of the Green just seconds earlier. A sprawling save by Luckenbill was all that saved Gagnon's respectability and the tie for Dartmouth.
Dartmouth had two solid opportunities late in the second overtime to steal a win but could not finish corner kicks from Melissa Roth '00 or Abby Gillard '01.
The very divided crowd had much to cheer about all day long as the two premier teams from the region combined for twenty-eight shots, with Dartmouth having twenty-one of those.
Four of those Green attempts were made by Gillard, the newest Ivy League Rookie of the Week, who played with a renewed confidence, seeming to dart toward the net at every opportunity.
"Today we were the better team, but didn't seem to get any breaks, which of course led to a lot of frustration out there," Gillard said, reitirating the frustration of Luckenbill.
If the Green is to have a successful weekend away from home, they are going to have to finish against the University of Maryland on Friday night and Monmouth University on Sunday. The Terrapins ride into the game ranked No. 19 in the most recent coaches poll and No. 4 in the Mid Atlantic Region.
Luckenbill sounded anxious to play the Terps and the Hawks.
"Hopefully we can get psyched up for Maryland. It is their homecoming and I would love to grab a win down there," she said. "Monmouth has beaten a lot of good teams and we cannot write them off as a win."
Even should the Green win four of their last five games and lose to Harvard, thereby losing the Ivy title, they would finish at 10-5-2, making it unlikely that they would garner an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament. Are they looking ahead to their Ivy matchups at Columbia and at home against Harvard?
Very possibly. Although wins over Maryland and Monmouth would give the team confidence.
"We are setting our sights on that Ivy title. It's been a goal of ours throughout the whole season, and we work hard to put ourselves in a position to accomplish that goal," Gillard said.
"However, all our games are important ones, and we go into each with a focus on the present opponent and try not to worry about bids or titles."
