Hartford blanks Cosmos

Girls' field hockey season opener hosted in Springfield results in a dominating 4-0 loss for the home team.

http://www.rutlandherald.com/article/20100909/SPORTS/709099993                 # # # # Hartford blanks Cosmos  •  Rutland Herald  •  Published: September 9, 2010  •  By POODY WALSH  •  Herald Correspondent  •  SPRINGFIELD - Before the season began Hartford coach Heather Scudder was talking about the 2010 Hurricanes perhaps being the best field hockey team she has had in the last four or five years. That was somewhat of a bold statement considering her team was 15-1-1 last year and won the Division I championship. However, with a dominating 4-0 win over Division II Springfield in the season’s opener for both teams, maybe there is no reason to doubt Scudder’s confidence.  •  Even though the score was just 1-0 at the half, the Hurricanes had a strong field advantage then put the game away with three second half tallies. In the end Hartford had a 14-1 edge in shots on goal and 15-3 in corners.  •  Keying the victory was the three-goal effort of Josie Kerrigan and the general all-around play of midfielder Shelby Yee, who had two assists and sparked the transition game.  •  “We’ve still got to grow,” Scudder said. “There were some things I didn’t like, but Shelby does a lot and was a key today.”  •  The endurance of the Hurricanes was also a factor and the Springfield players better bring plenty of water to upcoming practices.  •  “Our endurance just wasn’t there,” Springfield coach Bindy Hathorn said. “I told the girls to get ready to run starting tomorrow.”  •  Another factor was the Hurricanes returned a lot of players from last year while Springfield is still trying to figure out some things.  •  “We had some players in positions they never played before,” said Hathorn.  •  The day wasn’t a total loss for the Cosmos as Maria Stern, who has been a standout link for three years, had a strong game and Brittany Grant-Paul stopped 11 of 15 shots in the Springfield cage.  •  Scudder was also surprised the way Springfield took advantage of its free hits.  • “They have girls that can really drive the ball,” Scudder said.  •  After failing to connect on some early opportunities Hartford finally got one by Grant-Paul with 18 minutes gone in the game. Kayla Thibodeau got the goal, but it was set up on play that saw Cailtin LeBlanc put the ball on the stick of Bri Bergeron who let fly, but Grant-Paul knocked it out. However, it went right to Thibodaux who knocked it back in.  •  The Hurricanes made life miserable for Grant-Paul in the second half as they turned up the heat and scored three times as they got deep penetration and hard shots.  •  Kerrigan scored all the second-half goals as she was able to clear and able to get the fat part of the stick on the ball.  •  Her first goal came as she smacked in her own rebound. The game got to 3-0 on some nifty moves by Yee who chewed up a lot of yardage with some stick handling, eventually turning it over the Kerrigan who came into the middle from where she one-timed it into the net. The same duo connected for the fourth goal.  • Springfield’s only solid scoring opportunity came in the closing moments of the first half when Jesse Haskell had some room to shoot on a rebound off keeper Emma Seaver, but the attempt was wide.  •