No. 20 Orange Unable to Overcome First Half Deficit

Wednesday, October 3

University Park, Pa.

4 p.m.

Syracuse University

Penn State

Senior forward Gloria Nantulya scored her ninth goal of the season at No. 9 Penn State.

No. 20 Orange Unable to Overcome First Half Deficit

10/3/2007 6:41:57 PM | Field Hockey

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UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Senior forward Gloria Nantulya’s one goal and junior goalkeeper Heather Hess’ nine saves could not overcome No. 9 Penn State’s three first-half goals as the No. 20 Syracuse field hockey team lost a 3-1 decision to the Nittany Lions on Wednesday, October 3 at PSU’s AstroTurf Field in University Park, Pa. The Orange moves to 10-3 overall, while Penn State improves to 8-4.

“We started off strong, but had a seven minute lapse that Penn State exploited,” Orange head coach Ange Bradley said. “The team played well in the second half and got a goal on the board, but time just ran out on us.”

Syracuse scored a late goal at the 58:34 mark as senior forward Gloria Nantulya found some open space in the middle of the semicircle and one-timed a pass from freshman back Megan Keller past PSU’s Jen Beaumont for SU’s lone score of the game. It was Nantulya’s ninth goal of the year and Keller’s first career assist.

At the 15:45 mark Penn State began its hot seven-plus minute string of goals. First, Mallory Weisen scored off a wicked shot off a penalty corner to make it 1-0. Jen Long and Allison Scola assisted on the score. Then, at the 20:05 mark, Britney Long tipped in a pass from Kiersten Wood, who had sent the ball toward the cage, where Long was standing just to the left of and waiting to tip it.

Finally, just 2:27 later at the 22:32 mark, Natalie Blasco scored off an assist by Daneen Zug. Zug started the play when she sent in a pass to the cage that went off the post and also trickled off Hess' leg pads and right to Blasco, who was waiting on the weak side to finish.

The Nittany Lions outshot the Orange 20-5 and generated more penalty corners as well, 11-2.

Hess made nine saves in the cage for the Syracuse. Beaumont recorded two for Penn State.

The Orange returns home to host Villanova in a pivotal BIG EAST matchup on Sunday, October 7 at 1 p.m. at SU’s J.S. Coyne Stadium. For fans that cannot make the game live stats will be available on suathletics.com.