It takes three wins at the Big Ten championships for a team to take home the title.
But for No. 6-seed Northwestern, one win against No. 3-seed Penn State (15-3, 4-2 Big Ten) is enough for now.
“For our program and for Northwestern field hockey as a whole, our goal is to win a Big Ten playoff game,” NU head coach Marisa Didio said. “We have to keep our goals realistic.”
NU (6-12, 1-5) marches into Columbus, Ohio, today looking to advance past the first round of the single-elimination tournament for the first time since Didio took over the team in 1999.
The Wildcats are riding a wave of momentum after defeating Indiana on a last-second goal last Friday for their first conference win.
“(The win) gives us a huge lift going into the playoffs,” junior forward Katie Walshauser said. “We definitely made a statement to the rest of the Big Ten.”
The Cats followed that performance with a 3-0 shutout of Colgate two days later, ending a weekend in which NU outshot its opponents 34-9.
“We’ve stayed the course and have made the improvements we were supposed to make,” Didio said. “That’s why we are winning now, and it just shows that the kids are all responding at the right time.”
Just how much improvement the Cats have made should be apparent when they take on the No. 6 Nittany Lions for the second time this year.
On Oct. 5, Penn State had a difficult time disposing of NU at Lakeside Field, eking out a 1-0 win in overtime.
“We’re not expecting our squad to beat Penn State twice in one year,” Didio said. “But we are asking that we beat them once, and we have a better shot at it this time around.”
The Oct. 5 game wasn’t easy for the Cats to digest — NU surrendered 15 penalty corners and was outshot 14-1.
But NU did manage to stop all of the corners it conceded and play stellar defense, halting a team that had rolled over unranked opponents by as many as eight goals.
“Again, we’re going to need defense, defense, defense,” Didio said. “But I already know we are going to get that. We just need to generate the scoring chances that weren’t there (in the first game).”
Senior backs Lindsey Millard, Juli Fomenko and Stacy Spenser, each of whom may be playing her last collegiate field hockey match, anchor NU’s consistent defense.
Millard can also contribute on the other side of the ball. Although she has taken only five shots all year, she is tied for second on the team with four goals.
But the real question for the Cats has been the offense, which was shutout in five consecutive games earlier in the season.
“We have to work on moving things from the backfield up, especially in the first half,” Didio said. “But I know we will be putting ourselves in scoring position much more consistently than the last time we played (Penn State).”
The offense will have to rely on sophomore Candice Cooper, who leads the team with eight goals.
Freshman Holly Palin, who has started all 18 games for NU this season, has four goals and two assists.
After pounding Colgate and dominating Indiana, the Cats will have their work cut out for them against a sound Penn State defense and standout junior goalkeeper Annie Zinkavich.
The Nittany Lions have won their last three games, including a 3-2 upset of then-No. 1 Old Dominion.
But the Cats have a huge upset of their own to think about.
“We’re very excited to play this game, to upset this team,” Didio said. “But that excitement has to come with fundamentals and discipline.”
