Field Hockey comes up short at Temple

Three goals were not enough for the Quakers yesterday as they failed to start their first winning streak of the season. The goals are finally piling up. The problem is that the wins aren't following. The Penn field hockey team (3-9) failed to start its first winning streak of the season yesterday, as the Quakers lost to Temple, 4-3, at Geasey Field. After beating Bucknell, 4-2, on Sunday, the Quakers headed over to North Philadelphia with hopes of establishing a winning streak. And despite the fact that the Red and Blue put three goals on the board, the Owls (5-11) emerged victorious in the battle of the city rivals. "We were disappointed that we couldn't start a winning streak, but we felt good about ourselves," said Penn freshman Kylee Jakobowski, who scored the first goal of her college career yesterday. The Quakers do have reason to feel good about themselves. After several weeks of a scoring dry spell, they have exploded on the scoreboard recently, with seven goals in their last two games. Unfortunately for Penn, though, the three goals it put into the Temple cage yesterday were simply not enough. "It's disappointing, especially to lose to a team we all thought we could beat," Penn senior forward Courtney Martin said. Martin certainly did her part. With Penn trailing the Owls 2-1 with three minutes left in the first half, Martin tallied her first goal of the afternoon. She then came back to give the Quakers a 3-2 lead in the second half by scoring with 32:15 left in the game. "I've been feeling a lot of pressure to score," Martin said. "It's nice. Unfortunately, I'd rather get a win." After Martin gave Penn the lead, the Owls came back to tie it with 22:06 left when Temple's Torrie Russell beat Penn goalie Alison Friedman. Temple then took the lead for good when Laura Bergey scored on an assist from Kacy Ziomek with 16:24 remaining. The assist capped an excellent day for Ziomek. Earlier in the afternoon, she scored two first-half goals to give the Owls a 2-1 lead. Her assist on the game-winner put the exclamation point on her stellar day. While Ziomek may have been happy after yesterday's game, the Quakers are definitely not where they wanted to be at this part of the season. But Penn is still focused on finishing out the season respectably. The next test, however, will certainly be a tough one. On Saturday, Penn will host Ivy League-leading Brown at 10:30 a.m. The Bears are 4-0 in the Ivies and have an overall record of 10-1. The Quakers know that beating Brown will be a difficult task. "They're having an incredible season," Martin said. "We have two totally different styles. We have more of a finesse style. They hit the ball hard down the field." While the Bears are definitely a more talented squad than either Temple or Bucknell, the Quakers will still be hoping to find the cage several times on Saturday. "We've been making it our goal to get a corner, a shot or a goal when we get past the opponent's 25," Jakobowski said. Play inside the circle has been a major focus for the Quakers in recent practices, as Martin hopes to see scoring opportunities created by drawing more corners inside the 25. With five games remaining, the Quakers will be focused on scoring and improving, realizing that they cannot turn this season around now. "We are playing for pride right now," Martin said. "We can't dwell on our record."

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