On the good side, William and Mary (1-3) has proven they can score so far this season. Now they just have to prove they can do it more than once a game.
The Tribe dropped both of its match ups this weekend, falling to Northwestern 4-1 Friday night and losing to Radford 6-1 Sunday afternoon. The College has scored only one goal in each of their four games this year.
“I thought our play in terms of possession and pattern was pretty good,” Head Coach Peel Hawthorne said. “But possession doesn’t win games, scoring does. We are in a scoring drought right now.”
Things started well Sunday for against Radford when the Tribe received a pair of back-to-back penalty corners. After feeding the ball to a shooter and coming up empty on the first corner, senior defender Erica Eng decided to take matters into her own hands.
“On the play, I called to take [the shot] myself,” Eng said. “I knew it would be a goal before I got the ball.”
Eng put the Tribe up 1-0, but the Radford offense soon scored six unanswered goals, four of which came in the first three minutes of the second half.
“Mentally, we fell apart,” Eng said. “We weren’t working together—we were all trying to do it ourselves.”
The loss left Head Coach Peel Hawthorne looking for leadership.
“We talked about the difference between good chemistry and demanding the best of each other,” Head Coach Peel Hawthorne said. “We’re too nice to each other and we’re not as demanding of each other as we should be.”
Hawthorne was especially disappointed in her seniors, most of whom she removed at the end of the game in favor of freshmen and underclassmen.
“It’s the double edged sword of having ten seniors,” Hawthorne said. “The younger kids actually looked better today. They talked more and communicated better. This should serve as a wakeup call for the older ones.”
Hawthorne stuck with her seniors during the Tribe’s home opener Saturday afternoon that the College dropped 4-1 to Northwestern University.
The Tribe had several chances to get on the board, including two near goals by freshman Taylor Hodge in the 26th and 31st minutes. The Tribe remained scoreless until the 59th minute when Senior Erica Eng scored on a penalty corner.
Northwestern closed the game with a 17-8 advantage in shots. Junior goalkeeper Camilla Hill, who was ranked 21st in the nation with a .765 save percentage last year, struggled in the cage giving up four goals on 13 shots.
The weekend leaves the College and Hawthorne looking for answers as they get set to take on Davidson and Penn next weekend.
“This wasn’t even close to our best play,” Hawthorne said of her team at the end of the weekend. “It was painful to watch. They played hard but without purpose or coordination.”
