Ange Bradley knew she had insurance. The SU head coach felt a sense of relief, standing on the J.S. Coyne’s Stadium sideline, 20 minutes into the first half of Sunday’s 3-1 win over No. 20 American.

Even though American was the aggressor for most of the game to that point, Syracuse had the goal.

It seemed the Eagles (6-6) would be the first to efficiently halt the speed of Bradley’s team and break the No. 2 Orange’s unblemished record. Then, relief. Syracuse’s Lindsay Conrad scored to reverse American’s momentum.

‘That goal was huge,’ Bradley said. ‘Because when you’re pressuring and pressuring and pressuring and fighting such a physical game, spaces were so closed, when you break it you’re just, ‘Oooh, we broke through.”Conrad had two goals to propel Syracuse to a 3-1 victory. The Orange improved to 14-0 overall and is 3-0 in the Big East, remaining the only undefeated field hockey team in the nation.

Stuck in a stalemate of giveaways and takeaways on the midfield, the Orange only had four shots on goal in the first half. Dropping well behind the ball, American managed offensive rushes by packing its arc with defenders to take away the Orange’s big swings and shots.

‘They had 11 players behind the ball quite a bit, and there were two scorers dropping way behind into the midfield,’ Bradley noticed. ‘I knew that was to our favor.’

When a countered pass led to Schickhardt’s quick rush up the left in the second half – with four minutes left on the clock – SU’s defense recognized the play and eventually stripped Schickhardt of the opportunity.

‘We tried to focus on defensive structure in the back, so that if they break through we have enough people behind the ball to get them out,’ freshman defender Anne-Sophie Van der Post said.

Though Syracuse was limited to four shots in the first half, in the second half, the team fired off 14 more and two more goals en route to the win.

‘I think we organized ourselves much better in the second half,’ Bradley said. ‘We stepped up together, we played together, we fought together, and we won together.’American’s reluctance to change its drop-back strategy allowed Syracuse to capitalize on errors in the Eagles’ arc.

Conrad scored her second goal when goalkeeper Alyssa Poorman kicked a rebound directly to Conrad’s stick. Freshman midfielder Martina Loncarica scored the third goal when her shot tipped off an Eagles stick and rolled into the goal.American’s defense stopped all eight of Syracuse’s penalty corner opportunities. The Eagles defense also created dangerous counter attacks with long passes down to a waiting Schickhardt at the midfield line. But the Orange did enough to shut them out until the final minute.

The Schickhardt threat was diverted on one-on-one battles for nearly the entire game. The forward, who leads her team with eight goals, converted on the final penalty corner as time ran out to break the shutout.But Syracuse had already withstood Schickhardt’s best punches.

‘American gave a great fight, they pressured us real hard and they’re a tough team to play,’ Bradley said. ‘We were fortunate to win the battle.’

edpaik@syr.edu

Published on October 12, 2008 at 12:00 pm