As field hockey heads to the nation’s capital this weekend to take on Saint Joseph’s and American, they will be looking to improve upon their up-and-down, yet promising start.
Having scored five goals in all but one of its games this season, including exhibitions, MSU feels comfortable with how its offense is playing to start the season. After generating 28 shots in the game against Maine on Sunday, scoring goals and generating opportunities are not high on the list of priorities for this team.
Instead, tightening up team defense and continuing to build team chemistry will be on the forefront this weekend in Washington, D.C.
“For us, there’s areas of our game we have to improve on,” head coach Helen Knull said. “Specifically with our team defense, in terms of our ability to stay in the play longer. Our goals from our scrimmage and also last weekend we had a lot of numbers and situations in the backfield that we have to kind of work on cleaning up a little bit”
With three seniors leading the back end and a solid start to the season by redshirt freshman Simone Vagnoni, the Spartan defense appears to be in good hands going forward.
Senior defender Jenni Smith, named to the preseason 2014 Big Ten Players to Watch List, will look to help sure up the defensive side of the ball. However, Smith knows that MSU doesn’t have to sacrifice their offense in order to accomplish that.
“We had 26 shots on goal the other day, so we really want to keep pushing for that,” Smith said. “Also, work on our defense. We got a few inconsistent moments so just being consistent throughout the game and hopefully starting with a bang.”
Keeping an eye on the start of Big Ten play, Knull will lean on the senior leadership to get MSU playing to its full potential in every game and every practice. With seven of them on the team, their influence cannot be overlooked.
“They dictate the pace of our game. They dictate how we come in at practice. Their emotion kind of steers the ship of the team,” Knull said. “So far they’ve been doing a good job in leading by example and trying to get the momentum for the team going in the right direction.”
The Spartans will attempt to start heading in that direction on Saturday at 1 p.m. as they face off against Saint Joeseph’s. Following a night to recuperate, MSU will play American at noon on Sunday as they look to complete this weekend series.
