Senior midfielder Kristen Henn celebrates with teammates after scoring a goal Oct. 13, 2013 at Ralph Young Field. The Spartans defeated the Cardinals, 8-0. Khoa Nguyen/The State News
The field hockey team proved themselves as a top contender in the Big Ten conference during regular season. Today, they will put that progress to the test.
No. 3-seed MSU (9-9 overall, 4-2 Big Ten) will begin Big Ten Tournament play at 2:30 p.m. today as they take on No. 6-seed Indiana at Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio.
The regular season was by no means flawless, but there are positives to take from it.
The team finished on the upswing, going on a 6-3 run to end the season, after starting the season 3-6.
The 6-3 finish includes the Big Ten season, which saw the team win the first three games before dropping two against Penn State and Northwestern, and then closing with a win over Iowa.
“There’s a sense of excitement,” head coach Helen Knull said.
“It’s do or die right now … We’re excited about where we are. For us, it just comes down to trusting the process and the preparation we already put in place, and then doing that under pressure when the tournament starts on Thursday.”
The team believes the late-season momentum will carry though the tournament.
“It feels good to get a few wins at the end of the season and to end at .500,” said senior midfielder Kristen Henn. “We’re excited for Big Tens — it’s a new season, like you said. It’s exciting to play all the Big Ten teams again and focus on beating them this time.”
Indiana also finished 9-9 overall, but a 1-5 Big Ten record doomed them in the standings.
It helped that MSU beat Indiana during regular season in Bloomington, Ind., 4-3.
Junior forward Abby Barker notched a hat trick in the win.
MSU led the match 4-1 before Indiana attempted a comeback, scoring two goals in the final two minutes of the match.
Closing games have been an issue for the Spartans this year. They’ll look to put Indiana away early once more if they are lucky enough to build such a lead.
“The mindset is it’s just this go-get-it mentality that everyone (has), from freshman to senior,” senior goalkeeper Molly Cassidy said. “Everyone is excited, we’re hungry, we’re looking to go just hopefully meet a few teams that we feel like we didn’t play our best game against.”
A balanced offense and continued improvement on corner plays will be key points of focus in the first round of the tournament.
”As we went through the season, our corners really started to click for us,” Knull said. “For many teams, they don’t want to give Michigan State too many corners because we’re capitalizing on them. It’s a confidence thing. The chemistry starts to connect for us to, and that really came for us.”
The game can be seen on Big Ten Digital Network.
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