Tigers Stuff Stickwomen, 3-2

PRINCETON, N.J.--Even before overtime, Sue Caples knew something was wrong. The Harvard field hockey team that had started the game was not finishing it.

"The first half we played really well," said the Crimson's first-year coach, whose team fell, 3-2, to Princeton here Saturday in overtime. "In the second half, we came unglued. We were making mistakes all over the place. Princeton took it to us."

Harvard jumped to a 1-0 halftime lead, fell behind, 2-1, in the second half but evened the game at two before the end of regulation. Tiger midfielder Heidi Ludtke scored a goal off a corner five minutes into overtime, finishing the Crimson.

"We started off a little flat and got behind," Princeton Coach Beth Bozman said. "We weren't using our speed in the first half."

The loss dropped Harvard's record to 1-3 in the Ivy League (5-7 overall). Princeton's 4-2 league record is its best since 1982, when the Tigers won the Ivy championship with a 6-0 mark.

In the second half, Princeton reeled off six straight penalty corners, converting on two. With 29:20 left in the half, Tiger midfielder Gillian Thomson scored on a shot from in close.

Four minutes later Ludtke drilled a shot from just inside the top of the circle, which rolled past Harvard goaltender Denise Katsias.

Harvard evened the score with seven minutes left in the half. Char Joslin took a corner pass from Lisa Cutone and fired a shot into the right-hand corner of the Tiger net.

But Ludtke worked her magic again in overtime. And despite playing the final three-and-a-half minutes of overtime with a man advantage (Princeton forward Sue Finney incurred a five-minute penalty for questioning the officials' calls), Harvard could not even the score. Had the Crimson tied the game, another 10-minute overtime would have followed.

"We have to concentrate more when it gets down to overtime," Joslin said.

The Crimson had better luck defending Princeton's corners in the first half than in the second. Harvard stopped all three of the Tigers' first-half corners. Princeton went three-for-eight on corners in the second half and overtime.

"Our cover was not charging out high enough," Caples said.

Katsias, a senior, finished with 10 saves but was outperformed by her Princeton courterpart. Sophomore Liane Kersey recorded 16 saves. In her last 10 games, Kersey has surrendered just 10 goals.

Harvard went into halftime with a 1-0 lead thanks Sharon Landau, who ran down the right sideline and blasted a shot from 20 feet. The ball rolled past a stunned Kersey and rattled the cage.

"We played a really good first half," Joslin said. "We just lapsed badly in the second half."