Women's soccer team suffers rare pair of Big Ten losses at home

Losing Big Ten Conference games at home is not something to which the IU women’s soccer team is accustomed.

In the previous two years, the Hoosiers have gone a combined 7-1-1 in-conference at Bill Armstrong Stadium. This weekend, however, the Hoosiers (5-6-0) dropped two home games as they opened conference play against No. 22 Penn State and Ohio State.

Friday, IU lost to the Nittany Lions 1-0, and yesterday they were defeated by the Buckeyes by that same score.

“It’s unusual for us to lose at home, it really is,” said junior defender Kelly Lawrence. “It’s hard to take, especially for me being a junior and having one year to go, but we really just have to take strength from our performance. We really did play well and probably deserved to win (the Ohio State) game, but you have to put the ball in the back of the net to win the game.”

Friday night, the Hoosiers and the Nittany Lions played a scoreless first 39 minutes of the first half. Penn State’s lone goal came in the 40th minute from freshman substitute Meghan Gill.  

Gill took advantage of a loose ball, which bounced to her feet before she sent a spinning shot just inside the right post for the goal.

The Hoosiers were outshot significantly – 9-2 – in the first half, but in the second frame found a bit more offense, getting off seven shots, yet they were still unable to come up with the equalizer.

Despite the loss, IU coach Mick Lyon said he feels his team held its own against a squad that has won the conference the last 10 years.

“We played the best team and highest-ranking team for our opening act,” he said. “The freshmen in particular got to see the best of the Big Ten and know that they can play with them.”

Sunday, the Hoosiers played an Ohio State squad with much fresher legs, not having played since Wednesday. Despite that disadvantage, IU still came out strong in the first half, outshooting the Buckeyes 8-4 and taking five corners to the visitors’ one, but outstanding goalkeeping by Ohio State’s Lauren Robertson kept the ball out of the net for the Buckeyes.

The game was deadlocked at zero until the 79th minute, when the Buckeyes scored off a corner kick that deflected off the head of junior midfielder Christie Kotynski into the goal.

“We played outstanding today,” Lyon said. “The fact that we came back less than 48 hours later and played in this late-September heat, while your opposition hasn’t played in four or five days – I can’t say a bad word to the kids about how they played because it was tremendous.”

Although the Hoosiers dropped both games at home and will not be back at home until Oct. 17, freshman forward Carly Samp said she feels her team should have no problem being ready to play next weekend, first at Iowa on Friday, then at Minnesota on Sunday.

“We are definitely going to bounce back,” she said. “Our mentality has only grown. I think we are having a lot of energy coming into games now since we are in the Big Ten season.”