Laxwomen Looking to Recover against Brown

Although the Harvard women's lacrosse game against Brown this afternoon at Ohiri field won't be for the league championship or even national recognition, it may well be considered one of the most important contests of the year for the Crimson.

After dropping an 11-2 game to second-ranked Maryland Saturday in one of its worst losses in recent memory, fifth-ranked Harvard is in desperate need of a "w" to both remain in contention for a bid to the eight-team NCAA tournament and, Perhaps even more significantly, to build back its self-esteem.

"I think that this game can definitely be considered as one of the most important games of the season--at least in terms of momentum," sophomore Maria Hennessey said. "The Maryland loss was one of the the most depressing we have had."

"People were really down after the loss," freshman Liz Schoyer said. "I think everybody is just psyched to be able to play this soon after it, to have a chance to do well again."

Just how bad was the Maryland loss? Pretty bad.

Harvard went into the game on Saturday extremely confident. Most People saw the Crimson as being the Terrapins equal in talent at the very least. In addition, the home-field advantage put the squad over the top as the favorite going in.

But rain postponed the game until Saturday, and where the game went, the Crimson confidence did not follow: the team came out without its usual aggressiveness, and got burned for it.

"I would say that it was a very below average performance for us," sophomore Erin Cleary said. "We simply did not play hard enough to beat a team that good."

"I think that our biggest weakness was our attack," Hennessey said. "Although we game up 11 points, we never asserted ourselves offensively like we have at other times this year. The few times when we did, too, our shots were off."

Harvard will be looking to remedy those mistakes today against the Bears, who can only be described as a sub-par league team.

Brown comes into today's game with a 3-6 overall record and a 1-3 mark in Ivy league play. The team is coming off of a tight loss to Yale last Thursday, 8-7, and an 11-6 bludgeoning at the hands of the Penn Sunday.

"I can't say that I know too much about them except that they haven't been seen as one of the better teams in the league," Hennessey said. "We should beat them, but of course, you never know."

The Bears are paced by the sophomore offensive tandem of Kerri Whitaker and Melissa Pennacchia. Whitaker has tallied 17 points on the season (seven goals, ten assists), while Pennacchia has garnered 16 points (13 goals, three assists).

In goal, the team has been paced by another sophomore, Nancy Kendall. She has nabbed 81 saves this season at a 55 percent save average.

"They aren't supposed to be too big of a challenge, and I don't know that much about them, but I think they have got some people who can do some damage," Hennessey said. "I don't' think they will be a push-over, and I know we won't approach them as one."

The game is of crucial importance for the Crimson's NCAA playoff hopes; conventional wisdom says that Harvard must win all of its last four games--against Brown, Cornell, Dartmouth and Vermont--to be selected as one of the elite eight.

Of those teams, Dartmouth and Vermont are expected to pose the biggest challenges, but don't tell the Crimson--at least yet.

"At this point, we're taking it just one game at a time," Schoyer said. "We can't afford to overlook anyone. We're sort of walking on pins and needles."