Field hockey to face Brown & Syracuse in tough matchups

The Tigers defended their home turf as well as any of their fans could have asked for. Now the field hockey team is taking its talents up north as it takes on the Brown Bears and the Syracuse Orange for some weekend showdowns.

No. 19-ranked Princeton (6-4 overall, 3-0 Ivy League), tied with Penn for first in Ivy League standings, hopes to repeat its success against the Bears (6-6, 1-2), a team whom it thrashed 4-0 at Bedford Field last year. If the Bears want to have any chance of winning, they’re going to have to pick it up offensively — they’re ranked seventhin the league for goals scored per game. Princeton, for reference, is ranked secondin the category for the Ivies and 12thfor the nation.

As the Tigers look for their eighthstraight victory in league play (going back to the 2014 season), they’ll look to the usual suspects for that success. Senior striker Maddie Copeland and freshman striker Sophia Tornetta have both excelled this year. But, as anyone on this Tigers team will tell you, off-ball movement and converting off corners has been absolutely key to scoring production, both for Copeland and Tornetta, and also for the team overall. It certainly helps that players like senior striker Teresa Benvenuti and sophomore striker Ryan McCarthy have been setting up their teammates and rewarding the aforementioned strong off-ball movement.

However, a player any opposing team has to have on its radar is freshman back Nicole Catalino. She’s not only second on the team in goals scored but has also showed signs of the clutch gene in her short time at Princeton. In the team’s most recent game against Columbia, she came up big with the game-tying goal with just over three minutes to go and the game-winning goal in overtime.

These strong performances will be crucial not just against Brown but also against the Orange (13-0, 4-0), ranked no. 1 in the NCAA as of Oct. 13. While its ranking might be daunting, Syracuse has had to fight tooth and nail to defeat the Tigers in the past — it took them two overtimes to finally vanquish the Tigers in the teams’ meeting during the 2014 season.

One of the great benefits of Princeton’s schedule is that the team have already gotten ample experience playing against the best the NCAA has to offer. The Tigers opened their season against current no. 5-ranked University of Virginia and no. 3-ranked University of North Carolina and had to do battle with no. 7-ranked Maryland just a few games after. As the Tigers hope to translate regular season success into postseason accolades, they have to test themselves against such teams in order to get the best knowledge of how to improve when the real season begins.

The contest against Brown will beginSaturdayat12 PM and can be viewed on the Ivy League Digital Network. The game against Syracuse will commence at3 PMon Sunday.