Varsity Field Hockey won 5-0 against Wilcox High School on Monday, Sept. 11, in its first league game of the season. While the score was 0-0 by the end of the first quarter, the team quickly picked up after junior and right midfielder Tvisha Jain scored a goal in the second quarter with an assist by junior and offensive midfielder Erin Handelsman, followed by another four goals — two in the second, and one each in the third and fourth quarters.
Head Coach Amelia De Leon says the team’s teamwork was lacking early in the game, contributing to the stagnant score in the first quarter. However, she noticed significant improvement in cooperation as the game progressed.
“In the first quarter, we were struggling to connect passes,” De Leon said. “We would get possession and we would just immediately lose it. But as the game progressed, we were actually connecting passes and getting up the field in like two or three passes, which was great.”
Handelsman says adding communication was another factor that improved the team’s overall performance and helped them secure their passes in the later quarters. Sophomore and midfielder Monisha Preetham, who scored one goal in the fourth quarter, agrees. Preetham says the team usually tires out by the latter half, but, for this particular game, the team was able to overcome this unique challenge, even with only two substitutes.
“This was our first game with JV and Varsity split up,” Preetham said. “And the other team had more than twice the number of people that we did, so we had to learn to conserve our energy and use it when we needed to.”
This season, the team started a new ritual, in which they journal after each practice and game to encourage self-reflection. Their journal prompt for this game was to reflect on the pros and cons of the game and what they would like to work on in the future.
“We want to know what we want to be working on,” De Leon said. “We want to know what we’re happy with [and] what players are struggling with, so we can make drills that they’re happy with that help us work towards our next games. [It’s also used] for practices, so that [the team] can track their own conditioning stats, their runtimes, things like that, and so they can set personal goals and know what they’re working for in those practices.”
De Leon believes the team was able to adapt to the new “style of play” in this game but hopes players will continue to work on connecting their passes and learning to overpower the other team by using more skilled plays, like dodging and faster passing.
“We got lucky with the style of play with this team, so we’re going to need to use some more finesse, especially in this coming game,” De Leon said. “We’re playing Saratoga on Wednesday, and they are typically a very skilled team, so we’re going to have to play [using] a different style.
