The Behrend beacon. (Erie, Pa.) 1998-current, September 24, 2004, Image 9

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    Friday, September 24, 2004
Women’s soccer shuts out Thiol
By Mike Tomko
staff writer
Sept. 17 the Behrend women’s soc
cer team shut out the Thiel Tomcats 2-
0 improving their record to 3-1 -1. Jun
ior Colleen Applebaugh, who was last
weeks AMCC’s goalkeeper of the
week, recorded her third shut out of the
season for the lions.
“We are a very technical team and a
very smart team when our passes are
on,” said Applebaugh.
The Lions scored their first goal of
the game in the thirty-third minute of
play when junior Heather Crawford
came in off the bench and assisted jun
ior midfielder Michelle Newland. In
the fifty-second minute of play
Newland scored her second goal off a
header, this time assisted by sopho
more defensive back Crystina Hickey.
The Lions offense took twenty-eight
shots, five of them by Newland, put
ting 15 on target against the Tomcats.
Kara Struski also had five shots on goal
for the Lions.
“Considering the weather conditions
I think we played the ball smartly,” said
Applebaugh. “We were able to con
trol the ball even though the field was
soaked; it was a big swamp.”
On Tuesday, the lady Lions could not
continue their winning ways losing to
the Allegheny Gators by the score of
2-0.
Men’s water polo continues to make splashes
BY SAMANTHA CIBULA/BEHREND BEACON
Junior Brandon Sieber and freshman Andre Pranckevicius strategize before taking on Division II Slippery Rock on
Thursday.
By Kyle Woodside
staff writer
Have you ever been used to some
thing and then all of a sudden had
to change your ways? Well, that’s
good. Now you know how the
Golf makes history;
wins first tourney
By Jenna O’Block
staff writer
Despite the cold weather in Erie, amaz
ingly Behrend’s golf team is actually able
to play golf. The team is lead by James
Curren in his first year coaching at Behrend.
The team is made up of 12 men and four
women. Though some may not think so,
golf is a very competitive sport at Penn State
Behrend.
This year, with newly added ML Aloysius
to the AMCC, Behrend will play against
nine different conference rivals as well as
some other Division II and HI schools.
The team won their match at Peak n Peak
Sept. 16 with a score of 297. At Pitt
Greensburgh on Sept. 7 and Lake Erie Sept.
11, they came in second place with both
losses coming from Division II schools.
They took third at Pitt Bradford Sept 19
and Laßoche Sept 21. Their worst finish
of die season came at Penn State Altoona
on September 13 coming in seventh.
This is the first year the team has ever
won a tournament and also the first year
they have broken 300 as a team.
“I am very excited about how well the
team has been playing,” said sophomore
Josh Hull “With the great play of our co
captain Josh Loaney and the amazing tal
ent of our freshman class we received this
Sophomore Kara Struski took five shots on the goal against Thiel. The blue and white take on
State Altoona Sept. 25.
This marked the first game the blue
and white failed to score a goal this
season. The two goals scored by Al
legheny came from freshman defen
sive back Kelsey Boivin and freshman
men’s water polo team felt last week
when they had to face Gannon.
Gannon’s pool is about 10 feet
shorter in width than the pools
Behrend usually plays in. To further
complicate things, there is a wall in
stead of an open space where the
year, I am very excited for the ECAC’s and
AMCC tournaments.”
The players take in the responsibility of
figuring out each others schedules to deter
mine the times they are able to practice,
which is usually two times a week. They
practice at Gospel Hill golf course about a
mile away from Station Road.
The season ends Oct. 10 and they starts
back up again on April 8. Since it is hard to
predict the weather, if it snows the match
gets canceled.
“If it snows we just use orange balls” said
Hull jokingly.
The team is happy with their successful
season so far. Already they have captured a
first place finish, two second place finishes,
and three third place finishes.
“This year has been the most successful
season for Behrend golf during my four
years here,” said senior co-captain Jeff
Black. “We have a great bunch of guys that
can flat out play. We have very high expec
tations going into the next couple matches.”
“It’s a young team with a lot of talent,
and the team is also excited for Behrend’s
golf future,” said sophomore Josh Loaney.
The team is very proud of is Shelley
Leonard who was an individual medalist this
year at Pitt Greensburg with a score of 80.
The team hopes to be one of the favorites to
win the AMCC championship.
midfielder Rebecca Rotoloni, both
were unassisted.
“I don’t think we were focused. We
dominated for the first fifteen minutes
and we played our game,” said
out-of-bounds line is. Thus, when
expecting to be able to use the
whole pool, Coach Tristan’s Lions
hit the wall at times, literally. It
threw off their passing attack.
Despite the skewed pool dimen
sions and facing a tough Gannon
Men’s soccer team on fire
Beats Grove City College in final minutes
team now holds a record of 5-2
By Colleen Applebaugh
staff writer
The Men’s Soccer team is on fire
with a three game winning streak de-
Applebaugh. “I think the two things
that hurt us were our attitude towards
the middle of the game, we kind of fell
through the cracks. The second thing
was our passing wasn’t as effective as
squad at their place, the Lions
played as best as they could in
the 19-6 defeat.
“We forced 18 shots and lost
control of our game plan,”
Tristan said. “They had lots of
energy and we got intimidated
physically, but we still played
OK mentally.”
The score was 6-1 after the
first quarter and the Lions were
forced to play catch-up after that.
A potent offensive attack and a
mediocre referee enabled
Gannon to dominate.
Charles Doane, a phenomenal
player for Gannon, controlled
the “2-meter” position for the
Knights. He finished with seven
goals, four of which came in the
first quarter. A 2-meter is paral
lel to a center in hockey or has-
tball; he camps in front of the op
posing goal and tries to outmuscle
the opposing defender(s).
“We used three different guys on
Doane to try and stop him, but they
couldn’t. Water polo is more about
being a smart player than getting in
the ‘zone’. Doane saw our defense
and knew immediately how to score
on it,” said Tristan. “Next time we
face a tough 2-meter, we will try to
fearing Grove City Wednesday 1 -0
Veteran defender Luke Goldner
scored the goal, making this his first
for the season. This victory over
Grove City keeps Behrend first in the
The Behrend Beacon I
in the past.”
The Lions were out shot by Allegh
eny 10-11 and had four comer kicks
to the Gators six. Behrend goalie
Applebaugh made four saves on six
Gator shots that were put on target.
Juniors Katie Ritchey, Stephanie
Bowen, and Holly Greiner each had
two shots on goal for the Lions.
All ten of the Lions shots came dur
ing the second half of play. Despite
picking up their play in the second half
the Lions were still unable to cut the
deficient against the Gators.
“We attacked the goal a lot in the
second half and I would say most of
our shots came during the second half
toward the last ten minutes,” said
Applebaugh. “We picked up our play
at the end.”
Showing the persistence to win even
when you’re down is a good sign for a
team who hopes to win the AMCC
championship this season.
At this point the Lions sit at 3-2-1
with an upcoming game against Buf
falo State at home on Thursday. The
Lions kick off AMCC play on Sept. 25
against Penn State Altoona.
“Personally I feel that we have very
good chances of getting an NCAA bid
and winning the AMCC champion
ship,” said Applebaugh. “We have a
very skillful team even though we have
a very young team.”
change up the defense a bit in hopes
of better results.”
Anthony Spoto continued to shine
as he led Behrend with a hat trick.
Justin Ryder, Brandon Sieber, and
Steve Schleicher contributed with
one goal apiece.
Behrend looks forward to their
upcoming matches against
Mercyhurst and Slippery Rock,
both Division II opponents.
“Mercyhurst has only had two
games under their belt and we’ve
had nine,” said Tristan. “Also, we
beat them four times last year, so
our guys should be confident going
into the game.”
Slippery Rock was victorious
over the Lions earlier this year, but
Tristan hopes his team can beat the
Rockets for the first time in
Behrend men’s water polo history.
Behrend will be competing in the
W & J Invitational on September
25. The Lions are slated to play two
exhibition games. They take on
Carnegie Mellon at 10 a.m. and Yale
at 11 a.m.
At 2 p.m., Behrend will compete
against W & J. “If we win, we could
be in the top 10 in the Division 111
men’s water polo rankings,” said
Tristan.
conference with a 5-2 record
Saturday the team put Washington
and Jefferson away in a 2-0 victory.
Senior midfielder Jason Ferrier at
tributes the team’s success to their
determination to win.
“We have a drive to win and it kept
us going,” said Ferrier. “We had a
little bit of a rough start with our
away games, but we are picking up
the pieces and going to come out
strong this weekend against
Altoona.”
Team standouts this week were
sophomore keeper Matt Zimsak and
freshman midfielder Spencer Frank.
The AMCC named Zimsak goal
keeper of the week after capturing
three shout-outs. He now has five
shut outs on the season and leads the
conference in goaltending. Frank
who scored in the Washington and
Jefferson game was mentioned as a
member of the weekly AMCC best
of the rest honorable.
The blue and white take the field
again Saturday at Behrend fields
against Penn State Altoona at 3 pm.
This marks their first conference
game of the season.