Playing its final road games of the season this weekend, a determined Northwestern team stayed with both 19th-ranked Ohio State and 11th-ranked Louisville, but were unable to come out victorious against either team.
In pouring rain Friday in Columbus, Ohio, the Wildcats (6-12, 0-6 Big Ten) held the Buckeyes (12-6, 3-3) to only two goals on nine shots in the first period. But Ohio State broke the game open in the second half, taking eight shots – compared to the NU’s two – and scoring on four of them.
“We had ourselves in good position at halftime,” coach Kelly McCollum said. “I think that we lost our game plan a little bit in the second half. I think we had them, and we had moments and we had opportunities where we could have put ourselves more in the game against Ohio State and we recognize that we didn’t get that done.”
While senior goalkeeper Emily Kyle came away with seven saves, no Cat had more than one shot on goal as the Buckeyes completed their Big Ten-leading ninth shutout of the season. It was the NU’s sixth consecutive Big Ten loss this season.
On Sunday, the team came out with a new mindset against Louisville in Louisville, Ky.
“Our team just went out today with nothing to lose,” McCollum said. “We were going to go out and have fun and we weren’t going to over-think everything that we were doing.”
NU had to play its best to hold on against Louisville, and the team did. After the Cardinals (12-5) took the lead with a goal off a deflection early in the first period, juniors Liz Dobbs and Courtney Plaster-Strange each scored for the Cats, giving them a 2-1 advantage.
Yet Louisville was not done for the half. Just before the 50-minute mark, Tuli Lim scored her second goal of the period for the Cardinals, tying the score at two.
In the second half, Louisville overpowered NU, with 16 shots on goal and 12 penalty corners, but with Kyle’s seven saves and Plaster-Strange’s second goal of the game, the Cats pushed the Cardinals into overtime. Louisville dominated the extra period, taking nine shots while limiting the Cats to none.
Kyle had four saves in overtime, bringing her game total to 12 and her season total to 123, the most in Big Ten. Kyle also leads the conference in saves per game with 6.83.
“We were very competitive, we were really feisty and we capitalized on all our opportunities, and that kept us in the game,” said Dobbs, who scored her ninth goal of the season.
But 13 minutes into overtime, on the Cardinals’ fourth corner of the period, Nicole Youman scored to end the game and send the Cats home winless this weekend.
“It was a tight game all along,” McCollum said of NU’s first overtime game of the season. “And against a top team like Louisville, it was just really exciting to be in it to win it.”
