Bloomsburg Field Hockey Looks to Defend its Title

BLOOMSBURG— The Bloomsburg field hockey team will continue its quest for its fourth consecutive national title when they compete in this weekend's NCAA final four at Shippensburg University. Bloomsburg will join Shippensburg, U-Mass Lowell and Stonehill in this weekend's NCAA semi-finals. The Huskies will play Shippensburg on Friday November 11th at 5 p.m. and U-Mass Lowell will play Stonehill at 2 p.m. The winners will meet in the finals on Sunday, November 13th at 1 p.m.

Bloomsburg, three-time defending national champions, comes into this weekend with a record of 18-4 and the second seed in the South Region. The Huskies have won 12 NCAA titles under current head coach Jan Hutchinson, who is in her 28th season at Bloomsburg. However, Hutchinson does not like to focus on the Huskies previous success.

“We are not defending anything,” said Hutchinson. “Each year the team is a new team, with new teammates. We take the season one game at a time and try to make playoffs, which we did. Now we try to continue to play well each game in the tournament.”

The Huskies advanced to the NCAA semi-finals after defeating IUP 2-1 on Saturday in the quarter-finals. Kristy Kropa (Tunkhannock/ Lackawanna Trail) scored both goals including the game-winning goal in overtime with 11:59 remaining.

The Huskies are led in scoring by a pair of freshman. Forward Jamie Vanartsdalen (Philadelphia/ Lower Moreland) leads the team with 18 goals and seven assists, while forward Samantha Kropa (Tunkhannock/ Lackawanna Trail) is second with 12 goals and three assists. Vanartsdalen's 43 points is tied for sixth in NCAA division II. Mid-fielder Kristi Ney (Dauphin/Central Dauphin East), a pre-season All-American, and Maribeth Brozena (Larksville/ Wyoming Valley West), a two-time All-PSAC selection, are tied for the team lead in assists with eight each.

On defense the Huskies are led by pre-season All-American goalie Tracey Hudak (Sweet Valley/ Lake-Lehman). Hudak is 13-4 this season with a 1.28 GAA and five shutouts. She is sixth in the nation in goals against average and third in save percentage. The Huskies are also led on defense by All-PSAC selections Venessa Witman (Oley/Oley Valley) and Brittany Wilkins (Barto/Boyertown).

Shippensburg, who will be looking for its first NCAA championship, finished the regular season with record of 20-2 and are the number one seed in the South Region. They received a bye into this weekend's semi-finals.

The Lady Raiders pack a potent offense that ranks number one in the nation in scoring, averaging 4.91 goals per game. They are led by first team All-PSAC selection Ashley Watt. Watt leads the nation in scoring with 72 points (30 goals, 12 assists) and is 14 points ahead of the nation's second leading scorer. The Lady Raiders have three other players who are in the nations top ten in scoring. Sophomore Kristine Miller is fifth in the nation with 45 points, junior Natalie Grazan is tied for sixth with 43 points and freshman Kimberely Davies 39 points is tied for ninth.

The match up between Shippensburg and Bloomsburg should be an interesting one being that it is the fourth time the two teams have met this season. The nation's top two ranked teams battled for first place in the PSAC the entire season.

“It is always difficult to play the same team three or four times in one season,” said Hutchinson. “However, this is the way NCAA D-II competition is set up so we are used to it. We have won the last three titles under this format.  We just have to try and play our best one game at a time and not get caught up in the name on the shirt of our opponent.”

Shippensburg holds a 2-1 edge this season including a dramatic victory over Bloomsburg in the PSAC championship game. The Lady Raiders rallied from a 4-2 deficit with just 13 minutes remaining to win 5-4 and capture the PSAC title.

In the North Region semi-final match up, Stonehill will meet Massachussetts- Lowell. Stonehill, 19-2, advanced to the semi-finals with a 1-0 win over Bentley on Saturday. Sophomore Aly Boulis broke the scoreless tie with just over 13 minutes remaining in the second half.

The Skyhawks are led by a defense that ranks number one in the nation, allowing just 0.74 goals per game. Sophomore goalie Dani Ryder has 0.78 goals against average and six shutouts. All Northeast-10 selections Lindsey Breen and Courtney Campbell helped anchor the nation's top defense.

On offense Stonehill is led by sophomore Caitlin Gleason who had 13 goals and six assists to lead the Skyhawks in scoring. Junior All-American Kelly Latendresse is second on the team with nine goals and 13 assists.

UMass- Lowell, 18-3, is the number one team in the North region and received a bye into the semi-finals. The River Hawks will be making their third straight NCAA tournament appearance but are still looking for their first championship. They advanced to the national championship game in 2003, but fell to Bloomsburg 4-1.

The River Hawks are led by Northeast-10 Co-Player of the Year Joanna DeLuze. DeLuze had seven goals and four assists for 20 points in 19 games at midfield. UMass Lowell also has the nation's second leading scorer in Junior Sara Hohenberger who scored 23 goals and had 12 assists for a total of 58 points on the year.

On defense, goalie Nicole Staiti has 1.13 GAA average which ranks second in the nation. All Northeast-10 defender Josselyn Mroz anchors a defense that ranks second in Division II with 1.17 goals per game average.

The two teams have met twice this season with each team winning one game. Stonehill however defeated UMass Lowell 2-1 in the finals of the Northeast-10 Championship on October 30th.

Bloomsburg and Shippensburg have yet to play either Stonehill or UMass- Lowell this season.