Huskies begin season-long journey vs. Pioneers

By: Russell Blair

Posted: 8/29/08

Days after tying England's Durham University in their final exhibition of the season, the field hockey team takes the turf at the Sherman Family Sports Complex Saturday looking to win in their season opener against Sacred Heart.

UConn has not lost a home opener since 2002 and has lost only four such games under head coach Nancy Stevens' 18 year tenure.

"We take a lot of pride in how hard the team works in the preseason," Stevens said.

"We're allowed two weeks by the NCAA and for those two weeks there's lots of hard work and the pay off has been a successful result of all that hard work."

UConn has beaten the Pioneers in all three contests they have played, but the in-state rival is no pushover, qualifying for the Northeastern Conference tournament eight years in-a-row.

The Pioneers are led by senior Carisa Eye, who tallied 12 of the team's 26 goals last season.

"It's especially tough because we didn't play them last year, and it's their opener, so we have no scouting reports or film on them," Stevens said. "We need to focus on what we need to do if we want to win. We have to showcase our talent, this game is really all about Connecticut field hockey."

In the Durham exhibition Wednesday, 18 players saw playing time, something Stevens hopes to continue throughout the course of the season.

"We were playing to win, not to just give players time on the field, Durham was the 2006 English collegiate champion and runner-up in 2007," Stevens said. "This puts is in a good position, we have 16-to-18 players that can help us win, we are using that depth as an advantage, having fresh legs on the field is always an advantage."

In addition to learning how to utilize their depth, the team also took their exhibition as an opportunity to take what they had been doing in practice and execute it on the field.

While Stevens considered the tie a successful outcome against such a well-seasoned team, she still hopes her offense will be able to produce more scoring chances after being outshot 11-7 by Durham.

"We definitely need to generate more shots, its simple mathematics," Stevens said. "If you generate more shots you have more chances to score. This is going to be a focus for us in the upcoming game."

Stevens game plan of rotating her all-American backs up to play center-mid worked to perfection Wednesday as both Jennifer Kleinhans and Meghan Wheeler saw time at the position. Stevens hopes to continue this for the remainder of the season.

"Having an All-American at that center-mid position is essential," Stevens said. "Jen (Kleinhans) can really dominate a game in the midfield, the center-mid in soccer or field hockey is like the quarterback, and she plays that role really well," Stevens said.

Despite a lack of knowledge about the opponent, Stevens still feels the team can prepare well for their first contest.

"We just need to focus on what we know, our tactics and our set pieces, we need to execute well on set pieces to win," Stevens said.