Stickwomen Charge Past Wheaton, 3-0

The Radcliffe field hockey team cruised past Wheaton yesterday, 3-0, for its fifth win and fourth shutout in five outings. The game had been billed as a tough battle, but turned out to be just another one-sided step toward an undefeated campaign.

The contest was controlled, as all the others have been, by the strong Crimson front line of Gwill York, Jenny Stone, Karen Linsley and Sarah Mleczko. "Our biggest strength is our aggressiveness," Mleczko said yesterday. "We never give up, even when we're safely ahead. We're just a very steady team."

With the forwards keeping the ball in the offensive end and maintaining steady pressure on the Wheaton inner defense, it was only a matter of time until the domination showed up on the scoreboard.

Freshman Mleczko took care of the scoring in the first half, notching her seventh and eighth goals of the year. By the end of the game, she had personally accounted for half of the team's scoring total.

Off the Corner

Right inside forward Linsley put the game out of reach in the second half with a goal off a corner play.

Despite the fact that the Crimson defense has allowed only one goal in five games and has strung together three straight shutouts since a 2-1 squeeker over Bates, team captain Ann Dupuis, who leads the defense from her sweeper fullback position, still sees room for improvement.

"When we came off the field after the game, I think we all realized that we had some things to sort out," she said yesterday. "We were much better than they were--that showed in the score--but we played with them. We gave them more than they deserved, and let them get away with things that we shouldn't have through our own defensive mistakes."

That doesn't mean that the senior captain wasn't very pleased with the outcome. "It was a grudge match. Wheaton has humiliated us in recent years, snuck some wins right past us. It's a shame that we didn't score any more goals."

Linsley, the only other senior on the squad, also had previous years' games against Wheaton in the back of her mind when she took the field yesterday. "Last season's game was very frustrating for us. They beat us cleanly. But we're a much better team this year, and I think we beat them as cleanly this time around."

The stickwomen face another away-game challenge in Hanover, N.H., Saturday morning when they meet the strong Dartmouth squad. "The game should be as tough as any we've had," Linsley said yesterday.