Four goals in first doom Tigers

No more than six minutes had passed before talented Brown forward Kathryn Moos had put in her first of two goals on the day, and unfortunately for women's soccer, things were not about to improve on a rough Saturday afternoon.

The Bears (6-3-3 overall, 1-1-1 Ivy League) added another three goals before halftime and cruised on to a 4-0 victory. The loss was the third in the Ivy League for a Princeton team that has yet to score a goal against Ancient Eight competition.

Though neither team scored a goal for 20 minutes following the initial strike, in the 25th minute Brown midfielder Jill Mansfield scored the first of her two goals on the day. Moos and Mansfield each added their second goals of the game within the next 15 minutes to give the Bears a 4-0 lead heading into the break, a tally that would hold to the end of the game.

Princeton (4-6-1, 0-3-0) appeared flat, giving Brown the ability to play in attack mode throughout the game. When the final whistle blew, the Tigers had registered only three shots on goal to Brown's eight.

"I thought [Brown] was more athletic, they played with more intensity, and they were more opportunistic," head coach Julie Shackford said. "[Moos] killed us. They have good ball winners, they're balanced; and they have a good combination of athleticism, intensity and talented goal-scorers."

The Bears' dominant intensity fits in with the string of highly competitive opponents that Princeton has faced all this season.

"I think we have struggled not only with teams that are more athletic, but we've just struggled to match intensity with some of these teams," Shackford added.

After the lackluster first half, Shackford made a few lineup and formation changes hoping to at least make the game a little more competitive. These changes kept Brown from scoring in the second half, but despite playing from behind, the Tigers managed just a single shot in the half.

Princeton fell to 0-3 in the Ivy League with Saturday's loss. This was Brown's first league victory, having lost to Dartmouth, 1-0, and tied Columbia, 0-0. The Tigers have now lost to Yale, Dartmouth and Brown and are still hoping to secure their first Ivy win.

"We've consistently beaten so many of these teams over the years, and so there's nothing more they want than to kill us," Shackford said of the much tougher competition in the Ivy League.

Princeton's play broke down on both ends of the field. The team lost balls it should have won, and it was beaten to balls in the open field. When the Tigers did have opportunities to score, they were simply not finishing.

Though Brown's defense was pretty solid throughout the game, the Bears looked especially good on offense. They made some very nice, sharp passes in front of the goal that the Tigers just could not keep up with. And of course, their two goal-scorers had no trouble putting the ball in the back of the net.

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"We need to work on our individual battles — coming out and not letting your player beat you," junior goalkeeper Maren Dale said. "There was too much of that today, letting people get crosses off and shots off. We just need to come out and play harder and smarter — we definitely have the talent to do it."

Forward thinking

Hopefully Princeton will be able to improve on what happened against Brown on Saturday. The Tigers have two games in the upcoming week at home against a tough Bucknell squad (8-3-1) Wednesday and an Ivy League match-up with Columbia (5-4-3, 2-0-1) Saturday.

Even though Princeton's play wasn't stellar against Brown, many of the Tiger players and coaches believe a lot of the problems that they have been having are not due to lack of skill.

"Right now our biggest problems are not really technical, it's our ability to battle during the games," sophomore defender Taylor Numann said.

The season is nevertheless young, and the Tigers still have enough time to find that ability to fight and build up their intensity in order to win games.

"We have to be able to match the mentalities of other teams in terms of protecting what we've got as a team over the years," Shackford said. "We need to have some more pride and try to get the program back at a higher level."