The opposing team assembles. Four defenders and the goaltender line up to block the net while the Northwestern offense sends senior forward Regan Mooney to the baseline. The Wildcats are prepared to attack.
Mooney leans against her stick once, twice and then injects the ball into play. It shoots across the circle. Sophomore back Julia Retzky lays her stick horizontally on the playing surface to corral the ball. As the defense converges, star forward Chelsea Armstrong aims, fires and connects.
This is an example of a penalty corner, a scenario that has often been the difference between victory and defeat for NU this season.
After No. 17 Northwestern (10-4, 1-2 Big Ten) stumbled to a 4-1 loss at then-No. 18 Indiana (7-3, 1-1) on Sept. 23, the team focused on shoring up its corner play.
“We were something like 1-of-14 on corners,” coach Tracey Fuchs said following the Indiana game. “Usually we convert on 15 to 20 percent.”
Since then, the Cats have relied on the corner. NU hung with a tough Penn State (8-3, 2-0) bunch Saturday with the Mooney-Retzky-Armstrong combination producing consecutive goals to tie the game. Unfortunately for the Cats, the Nittany Lions were also able to take advantage of their opportunities, scoring off of two penalty corners in their 4-3 victory.
Looking ahead to Friday’s Big Ten home opener against Michigan (8-3, 1-1), senior back Megan Jamieson said the team must improve its penalty corner defense.
“The focus for this week is limiting defensive corners,” Jamieson said. “In our two Big Ten losses, that was the area where we got outplayed.”
The Wolverines have outscored opponents by a stunning margin of 27-3 over their past seven games, and two of their three losses came against the sport’s elite in No. 3 North Carolina and No. 5 Maryland.
Perhaps more pertinent for NU, Michigan has a penchant for drawing corners.
In a recent 2-0 shutout against then-No. 12 Iowa (8-3, 1-2 Big Ten), Michigan posted seven penalty corners in the first half, one of which contributed to its first goal of the game. The Cats will need to keep that number low if they hope to even their conference record.
The team has another home game Sunday against fellow academic powerhouse Yale (4-5, 2-1 Ivy League), which narrowly fell to No. 2 Connecticut 1-0 in its last outing.
The message is clear for NU heading into the late season: win the penalty corner battle.
