Western Connecticut beats the Lady Bears in overtime thriller
By Jonas Joseph
Comment Contributor
This weekend was not kind to the Lady Bears field hockey team, as they were downed by the Western Connecticut Colonials 2-1 in overtime.
The dagger that snuffed out Bridgewater’s chances of chalking up a “W” could be accredited to Caitlin Orgizovich, who hit an astonishing reverse chip shot in the 77th minute that would have been difficult for any goalie to defend.
The Colonials opened up the scoring in the sixth minute, thanks to freshman forward Greta McConnell, who was assisted by junior midfielder Jenny Cappelllo.
BSU had a beautiful scoring opportunity, which was denied by a defender who made the save off of a deflected shot.
On another occasion, the Bears were denied another scoring chance by the Colonials’ netminder, who stopped Bears’ junior forward Kelsey Kiely in the sixth minute, which kept the game at 1-0.
Bridgewater’s brief scoring drought ended in the 24th minute due to a penalty shot, which hit off the stick of freshman defender Janet Maher, who scored her first collegiate goal.
As exciting as that goal was, the contest would go scoreless for the next 53 plus minutes before Western Connecticut sealed the win.
“I believe that we were evenly matched, but we just didn’t capitalize on some chances,” said junior defender Cailin Flannery. “We need to get better as a team if we want to experience success in the future. We have a good group of girls who are constantly fighting to better this team, and I have no doubt that we’ll get back on track.”
Overall, the Lady Bears outshot the Colonials 12-8 and had an 11-8 advantage in penalty corners. Saturday’s game was a demoralizing blow for the Lady Bears, as they now fall to 5-8 overall and 3-4 in MASCAC conference play.
“Having been undefeated in overtime competition this season, it was a difficult loss to take,” said Head Coach Tia Pydynkowski after the game. “We told the team that we have to be able to capitalize on our opportunities, and we were not short of these today.”
The Bears travel to Little East rival Umass Dartmouth for a date with the Corsairs, who are 7-7 overall and 5-2 in conference play. The Bears will be hungry to get on the winning side of things, so this should be an interesting matchup.
Moving ahead, the Bears will look to stay upbeat and push toward a playoff berth despite their slow start.
“My expectations for the rest of the season are to continue playing as a unit and make it into the playoffs,” said Pydynkowski. “We have put ourselves in a difficult position, but we fully expect to pull out of this and come out on top. We have a lot of depth on our roster and we are now learning how to come together and use our talents as team and not as individuals.”
