STANFORD, Calif. — Anya Jackson’s five saves highlighted a tightly-contested bout as the Stanford field hockey team battled hard but could not mount a comeback, falling 2-0 to No. 3 Virginia at Varsity Turf on Sunday afternoon.
“I felt that at halftime we had a good conversation of what we needed to adjust but I think we fell short of that today,” said Susan Ewing York Director of Women’s Field Hockey head coach Roz Ellis. “Defensively we played really well and we were defending hard but we need to be more technically sound offensively.”
Stanford, which used the elation from Friday’s win over No. 16 Louisville to start out as the aggressor, mounted multiple attacks against the Cavaliers. However, Virginia did well to dispel the Cardinal offense as Stanford mounted one shot on frame in the opening quarter. Defensively, Stanford held strong in the opening frame, negating two Virginia penalty corners while Jackson earned one save on five shots faced in the frame while Mia Clark’s defensive save in the final five minutes kept the scoreline knotted, 0-0.
Looking to find the breakthrough in the second quarter, both sides continued to claw through the midfield and into the attacking 25-meter area to find a chance to open the scoring. Though Stanford had its first major chance off of a penalty corner, the Cardinal could not capitalize while Stanford's defense held strong to keep Virginia off the scoresheet and the game tied into halftime, 0-0.
Looking to turn the tide, Stanford had its moments in the midfield to funnel chances forward but the Cavaliers had other intentions, hemming the Cardinal in its own half for a majority of the quarter. Though Stanford had kept a majority of UVA’s attacks to the perimeter in the first half, the Cavaliers found the game-opening goal with Suze Leemans firing home a rebound past Jackson after the Stanford goalkeeper had turned aside the initial shot to give the visitors a 1-0 lead just three minutes into the quarter.
Stanford, though, held strong for the remainder of the third, begating the other two penalty corners awarded to Virginia while turning aside four other shots faced to head into the fourth down, 1-0.
With the final 15 minutes of action coming to a head, Stanford continued to battle, funneling multiple balls and mounts of pressure in the Virginia half. However, the Cavaliers kept the Cardinal from the cage as Stanford could not send a shot toward the goal. On the other side, Virginia - which had moments on the counter-attack - used a quick restart just over six minutes into the frame to extend its lead as a two-on-one play resulted in Riley Savage tipping a shot-pass from Leemans past Jackson to give Virginia a 2-0 lead that it saw to the final whistle.
“We just pushed too late,” said Ellis. “We have to take risks and be brave from the first quarter to the fourth and for UVA’s ability we needed to attack them from the start and we did not do that today.”
Stanford heads into the bye week with just under two weeks to prepare for two high-end Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) opponents, hosting Syracuse and Boston College at Varsity Turf on Friday, October 10 and Sunday, October 12. First strike against the Orange is slated for 5 p.m. while Sunday’s match against the Eagles is scheduled for 2 p.m.