University of Connecticut Athletics
Dartmouth vs. Connecticut Game Notes
10/29/2001 12:00:00 AM | Women's Soccer
This week: The No. 9 Huskies closed out a three-game homestand with an overtime win over nationally-ranked Harvard on Wednesday. UConn will then travel to Hanover, NH to face its second Ivy League opponent in as many games for a Monday afternoon match-up. The Huskies will conclude the regular season with a game against rival Yale on November 1 before gearing up for the BIG EAST Championship.
Last Week: Connecticut enjoyed a 2-0 week at the expense of Pittsburgh and No. 4 Notre Dame. The Huskies shut out the Panthers on Friday 3-0 and downed the Irish 3-1 on Sunday in front of a vocal crowd of 2,017.
Last Game: The Huskies needed a little bit of extra time to send No. 18 Harvard home with a loss, as UConn got a goal from senior Mary-Beth Bowie five minutes into overtime for a 1-0 win. The Crimson were aggressive in the early going, outshooting the Huskies 5-4 in the first half, but Connecticut regrouped to control the rest of the game and allowed only three more shots to its 11. Things got interesting in the overtime period when freshman Zahra Jalalian took a pass from the midfield and had a clear path to the goal. Harvard keeper Cheryl Gunther came out to make the save, but she ended up tackling Jalalian just outside of the penalty area and received a red card. Her replacement, back-up keeper Robyn Scatena, then had to defend against senior Casey Zimny’s free kick from 18 yards out. Scatena made the initial save but couldn’t hold on, and Bowie blasted home the rebound for the game winner. UConn goalkeeper Shanna Caldwell, making her fifth straight start in goal, made five saves on the night as Connecticut extended its winning streak to five games. The Huskies also improved their record to 7-2 this season against ranked teams.
Scouting the Big Green: Dartmouth goes into Wednesday’s game having won three straight games with a contest to play on Saturday against Harvard. Second-year head coach Erica Walsh saw her team drop out of the NSCAA/adidas poll early in the season after back-to-back losses to Princeton and Hartford. However, the Big Green have played well of late, only dropping a game to Boston University while stringing together five wins and a tie. Annie Gibson and Laura Ashley lead the team in scoring, each with 11 points. Goalkeepers Julia Shields and Anne Marbarger have split time this season. Each has two shutouts to her credit, though Shields sports the better goals against average at 0.78.
The Series: Wednesday’s game will be the13th in a series that dates back to the UConn program’s inception in 1979. The Huskies have owned the series with 11 wins. Dartmouth won its only game in the series last season, snapping Connecticut’s streak of dominance. UConn is 4-0 in games in Hanover, NH, though three of those games have been decided by a goal and two have gone to overtime. The Huskies and Big Green have met three times in the postseason, with Connecticut taking all three games.
Last Meeting: Dartmouth won its first-ever game against UConn last season, when the Big Green came to Storrs, CT and claimed a 4-2 victory behind two goals and an assist from Jessica Post. Devon Haskell and Katie Price also scored goals, and goalkeeper Kristin Luckenbill gave up two goals but made five saves in the win. The Huskies owned the 13-9 edge in shots.
Unlucky No. 9: This is the third time this season UConn has been ranked No. 9 in the NSCAA/adidas Poll. Last time the Huskies were ranked ninth, they lost to No. 13 Florida and unranked Boston College in the same week and dropped to No. 15 in the next poll. Prior to that, UConn lost to unranked Ohio State while ranked ninth and fell to No. 11.
Shutout City: The shutout against No. 18 Harvard was UConn’s ninth of the season and fourth over a ranked opponent this season (Massachusetts, Miami and West Virginia). The Huskies have only allowed one goal in their last five games, and Dartmouth’s only losses this season have come when they’ve failed to score a goal.
One Fine Afternoon: Connecticut’s 3-1 win over No. 4 Notre Dame on Oct. 21 may have extended the Huskies’ winning streak to four games, but in many ways it meant much more. UConn hadn’t beaten Notre Dame since the 1997 NCAA Tournament semifinals, and the win was also their first over the Irish at Morrone Stadium. The Huskies were also the first team to score three goals on Notre Dame since the Irish lost to then-No. 1 Santa Clara 4-2 on October 17, 1999.
Tack On One More: UConn’s win against Pittsburgh on Oct. 19 guaranteed the program’s 23rd straight winning season since its inception in 1979. The Huskies’ all-time record currently stands at 380-102-24 and 356-92-22 in the Len Tsantiris era.
Down The Stretch: No matter how the team starts off the season, Coach Tsantiris always seems to have them playing well by the time postseason rolls around. Since Tsantiris took over the program in 1981, his teams have put together a 42-14-4 record during the last three games of the regular season. The Huskies have swept the last three games of a regular season eight times, and only once (1992) have they lost the last three.
BIG EAST Northeast Champions: The Huskies sealed their third straight BIG EAST Northeast Division title against Syracuse on Oct. 5. The 3-1 win over the Orangewomen, coupled with Boston College’s upset win over Miami, was enough to clinch the title with one game remaining. Boston College, Miami and St. John’s are the other teams from the division that earned conference tournament bids, and Notre Dame, Rutgers, West Virginia and Villanova will fill out the Mid-Atlantic Division side of the bracket. The tournament starts Nov. 3 and 4 at campus sites and continues in Piscataway, NJ on Nov. 9 and 11 with the semifinals and championship game.
Two’s A Perfect Number: Though the Huskies haven’t allowed a team to score more than two goals a game the entire season, the difference between allowing one goal to two is astounding. When UConn allows less than two goals per game it has a perfect 13-0 record. However, the Huskies have lost the four games in which they’ve allowed a pair of goals.
And A Freshman Will Lead Them: Freshman Kristen Graczyk broke out of a scoring slump on Oct. 19 against Pittsburgh. The forward from Albuquerque, NM started the season with seven goals in her first eight games but had gone six scoreless games before netting Friday’s game winner. The goal was her team-leading eighth, and she also leads the team in scoring with three assists for 19 points. That total is good enough to tie her for seventh in the BIG EAST in scoring. Her nine points (four goals, one assist) in divisional games ties her for third, two points behind Boston College’s Sarah Rahko and teammate Alexa Borisjuk, for best in the conference.
Clutch In Conference: Senior Alexa Borisjuk is tied with Boston College’s Sarah Rahko for best in the BIG EAST in scoring for regular season divisional games. The forward had three goals and five assists in six Northeast Division games. She scored a pair of goals against Miami on Sept. 28 and netted the game winner against Syracuse on Oct. 5. She also assisted on the game-winning goal in UConn’s 2-1 overtime win over Providence on Sept. 30.
Good Things Come In Pairs: Seniors Shanna Caldwell and Casey Zimny were named BIG EAST Co-Goalkeeper and Defensive Player of the Week, respectively, by the conference on Monday. The honor was the first for both this season, though the Huskies have been no strangers to weekly conference honors this season. UConn has earned one of the four BIG EAST awards in six out of seven weeks thus far and has four times had a pair of honorees in the same week. The Huskies, with two weeks remaining in the regular season, have already exceeded their number of winners from the past two seasons combined.
More Honors: For a second straight week a UConn women’s soccer player has earned a spot on the Soccer America Team of the Week. Last week it was freshman Zahra Jalalian, and this week it was senior Casey Zimny. Zimny was one of 11 players nationally to make the team. In addition, she was also named to the Soccer Buzz National Elite Team of the Week. Zimny was the first UConn women’s soccer player to earn this award this season, which is also given out to 11 players nationally.
Shanna Steps Up: Senior Shanna Caldwell hadn’t made a start in goal since the 1999 season, but that hasn’t hampered her much lately. The Williamsburg, VA native got her first start against West Virginia on Oct. 12 and has shown no signs of giving it up. She has gone 4-0-0 in her starts and has posted two solo shutouts and combined with junior Maria Yatrakis for another. The only goal she’s given up this season came on Sunday to Notre Dame. Otherwise, her goals against average stands at a miniscule 0.21 in 428 minutes of play.
Playing D: Senior defender Casey Zimny has been rock solid for the UConn defense so far this year. She has anchored a defense that has produced eight shutouts and allowed 0.75 goals per game. She was a major factor in the win over the Irish, disrupting runs and clearing passes out of the box in 90 minutes of action. The senior also scored UConn’s first goal of the game on a free kick from 18 yards out, her first tally of the season and first since November 20, 1999. Her conference honors were the first this season but the third in her career. She earned Co-Defensive Player of the Week honors last season on Oct. 9 and Rookie of the Week honors her freshman season on November 2, 1998.
In the Polls: After a 2-0 weekend that included a win over No. 4 Notre Dame, the Huskies jumped back into the top 10 in the NSCAA/adidas Poll at No. 9. Top-ranked North Carolina was the only ranked team to stay unbeaten this week, as previously unbeaten UCLA and St. Mary’s (CA) both suffered losses to Santa Clara last week. As a result, Santa Clara and UCLA flipflopped positions at No. 2 and 3 while St. Mary’s held steady at No. 7. With the loss at UConn, Notre Dame fell four spots to No. 8, with Penn State and Nebraska occupying its previous slot. West Virginia, the only other BIG EAST representative in the poll, dropped from No. 21 to No. 24 though going 2-0 against George Mason and Miami over the weekend. In the NSCAA Northeast Regional Poll, Connecticut reclaimed the top spot after playing second fiddle to Harvard the past two weeks. The Crimson dropped to second in the region, with Hartford, Massachusetts and Boston University rounding out the top five.
Rubbing Shoulders With The Ivy: The Huskies’ last three games of the season come against three teams from the Ivy League: Harvard, Dartmouth and Yale. Harvard is the only team in the trio that is currently nationally ranked, though Dartmouth had been ranked earlier in the season. UConn will close the regular season on Nov. 1 hosting Yale before gearing up for the BIG EAST Tournament on either Nov. 3 or 4. All first round games will be held at campus sites while the semifinals and championship game will be held in Piscataway, NJ on Nov. 9 and 11.
Bigger is Better: The NCAA Executive Committee has approved the expansion of the field for the Division I women’s soccer championship, effective with the 2001 tournament. The women’s bracket will expand from 48 to 64 teams, with 28 conferences being awarded an automatic berth and the remaining 36 teams receiving at-large bids. In 1998, the tournament expanded from 32 teams to 48.
