CAPE ELIZABETH – You can’t win if you don’t score, and on Oct. 3 the Cape Elizabeth field hockey team rarely even came close.
Facing the powerful York (10-1) defense, Cape Elizabeth managed just four shots on goal in total over 60 minutes of play.
It was the fourth time the Capers have been shut out in 2011, and the second time it has come at the hands of the Wildcats, who also blanked Cape 2-0 back on Sept. 13. This time it was by a slimmer margin – just 1-0 – but no less painful for a Cape team (2-7-1) that entered the season with high hopes, but it now just looking to salvage some dignity.
“It’s the same as every game,” said Cape Elizabeth Head Coach Darci Holland. “Scoring has not been our strong point this year. No matter how many practices or scrimmages we have; no matter what we do, we just cannot find the back of the net.”
Cape struggled to find the other side of the field, let alone the back of the net. That isn’t to say that the Wildcats peppered Cape Elizabeth keeper Julianne Ayers with shots – Ayers just saw seven balls come her way – but the York backfield seemed at times like an impenetrable wall on Monday, preventing frequent Capers’ trips into enemy territory. In fact, there seemed to be just one weak spot, and Holland did her best to exploit it as soon as she spotted it.
“Halfway through the game I switched my forwards, because the only place we seemed to be having any success was on the right side,” she said. “My mids kept on trying to get it to the left side, but I was like ‘no, the only place we’re going to get any yardage is on the right.'”
And, indeed, most Cape runs at the York net came thanks to Hannah Newhall rushing down the right sideline. But these weren’t frequent joyrides, and sooner or later, the York pressure was going to make a difference. As it turned out, it was sooner. 11:20 into the first half, Wildcats forward Taylor Simpson hauled in a pass a few feet inside the Cape circle, centered, and went low with a shot that bounced by Ayers to make it 1-0. That, as it turned out, was the game-winner.
Ayers spent the rest of the game giving her teammates every opportunity to close the gap. Ayers made saves on shots off corners at the 8:30 and 6:15 mark, and blasted and impressive kick save with 1:32 left in the first on a shot by Meghan Boria-Mejer.
Undoubtedly, though, Ayer’s most impressive stop came with 5:42 to go in the second, as she went into a slide to punt out a shot by Cari Posternak.
“She is wonderful,” Holland said of her keeper. “She is a junior, and her confidence has just exploded. Coming into this season you could just tell she was a different player. She has kept a lot of games for us from being those 5-0, or 10-0 scores.”
But Ayers couldn’t will her team to do the most important thing: score. Despite two second-half timeouts to attempt to spark something, Holland and company were unable to make headway against the Wildcats’ defense. A crazy last-second breakaway by Newhall might have been the difference-maker, but she lost her footing on the wet field turf while trying to push in a shot with under 20 seconds to go, and York took it back the other way for the win.
“We are super young this year,” Holland said, looking to the future. “We have three seniors starting, and we have three girls total who played last year and got quality time on varsity. So we are young, but even playing a team like York, we were right there at the end. And I told them that were probably the hardest they had worked all year. You know, we started the season in kind of a rough spot, but there is nowhere to go but up.”
The Cape Elizabeth field hockey team’s only hope on Monday nightSend questions/comments to the editors.
