Oct. 7, 2003
East Lansing, Mich. - Stanford (3-9) concluded its three-game Michigan road trip with a 2-1 loss to Central Michigan (4-7) in a non-conference neutral site contest on Tuesday at the MSU Field Hockey Complex in East Lansing, Michigan. Central Michigan jumped out to an early 1-0 lead on an unassisted goal by Tarah Trottier at 5:51 and Kristy Reed added an insurance goal the Chippewas would need when she scored on a penalty corner at 54:00 with Amy Kaufman assisting. Stanford's Molly Melcher cut the Central Michigan lead in half when she scored her first goal of the season on an assist by Eleanor Morgan at 62:14 but the Cardinal was unable to score again.
"We were unlucky not to be able to equalize the game today," said Stanford head coach Lesley Irvine. "We were pleased with the way we played in the second half, but we were not able to fully recover from a slow start."
Central Michigan held a slim 18-14 advantage in shots. The Chippewas' 20 penalty corners doubled the 10 earned by the Cardinal.
Reed led all players with 11 shot attempts, while Cara-Lynn Lopresti attempted a team-high four shots for the Cardinal.
Danielle Frank stopped eight Stanford shots to pick up the victory and improve to 3-3. The Cardinal split time in the cage between Ana Kralovec and Emily Zander. Kralovec (1-3) played the entire first half and suffered the loss, giving up a goal and recording five saves. Zander replaced her at halftime and also allowed one goal, while picking up a pair of saves.
Melcher's late goal helped Stanford avoid being shutout for the third straight game for the first time since being blanked in four consecutive contests from September 10-23, 2000. The Cardinal lost for the eighth time in its last nine games overall.
Stanford (1-1 NorPac) will travel across the Bay for a key conference showdown at NorPac West Division leader California (5-2, 4-0 NorPac) on October 11 to conclude the team's current four-game road stretch. Stanford needs a victory at California to stay in contention for the regular season NorPac West Division title. California squeezed out a 4-3 overtime victory over the Cardinal on The Farm in the first meeting between the teams this year on September 20 and has won six in a row over Stanford overall. Despite the six-game skid versus the Golden Bears, Stanford has still won 17 of its last 25 contests versus NorPac competition.
The Cardinal returns home for an exhibition contest against its Alumnae on Sunday, October 19 (1 pm, PT) before hosting Southwest Missouri State in its final two regular season home contests on Sunday, October 26 (1 pm, PT) and Tuesday, October 28 (11 am, PT).