Northwestern University Athletics
Wildcats Hit Road For Utah
9/1/2004 12:00:00 AM | Women's Soccer
Sept. 1, 2004
EVANSTON, Ill. - After a full preseason, and a weekend at home to kick off the 2004 season, NU women's soccer coach Jenny Haigh gets the sense her team is ready for something new.
"I think the women are excited to get on the road," she said. "We have been on campus for awhile now. It will be nice for them to get off campus and spend some quality time together."
Certainly she picked a gorgeous locale for them to make their first trip of the campaign. Utah is one of the nation's most picturesque states, and that is where the team will touch down for a pair of matches.
NU starts the trip with a Thursday night match at Brigham Young (7 p.m. local, 8 p.m. Central), then follows it up by playing Southern Utah on the BYU campus Saturday (1 p.m. local, 2 p.m. Central).
Focus will be a theme as the `Cats take the field Thursday, and not just because of the surroundings.
"We need to make sure we string together two good 90-minute efforts this weekend," said Haigh. "A big win like we had Sunday (5-1 vs. Colorado College) can lull a team into a false sense of optimism and relax them. We are playing two very good teams this weekend, starting with BYU."
The Cougars opened their season with a 3-1 loss to Idaho State, then fell to No. 11 Kansas 1-0 Monday in Provo. However, it is a team that finished last season with a spot in the Elite Eight at the NCAA Championships and was ranked 14th in the final NSCAA national poll -- the sixth time in seven years the Cougars have finished the season ranked in the national coaches poll.
"BYU will be a good team, and I expect them to come after us hard because they are still looking for their first win," said Haigh. "They are athletic and competitive year in and year out, and we will have to play a great match to beat them when they are at home and playing under the lights."
Saturday brings Southern Utah, which opened the season with 2-1 losses to Weber State and Idaho State. Last year, the Thunderbirds struggled to a 2-17 record. However, Haigh is not taking them for granted.
"We do not know a lot about them, but what we know is that they are a feisty team that will grind it out," she said. "We need to try to determine the tempo of the match, and if we are able to do that I like our chances a lot more.
"If we enter our games prepared, we should be able to compete in every match we play," she continued. "The intangibles are so important, and that will be the case again this weekend. I was happy with the way we came back against Missouri and then how we played against Colorado College. We need to continue doing that to have success."
Some notes on the `Cats...
* NU trails the all-time series with Brigham Young, 3-0. The last time these teams played was Sept. 7, 2002 in Provo, with the Cougars winning 5-0.
* NU and Southern Utah are meeting for the first time in women's soccer.
* The last time NU started a season 2-1 was 1998, when the team broke out of the gate with a 9-0-1 mark. The 2002 team was 2-1-1 after four matches.
* Shannon Schneeman is coming off a school-record four-goal match against Colorado College. Prior to that match, she had one collegiate goal.
* Kelsey Hans has scored in two straight matches, marking the fifth straight year an NU freshman has pulled off the feat.
* The last NU player to score in three straight matches was Aileen Guiney in 2002 (vs. Indiana, Wisconsin and Minnesota).
* The last NU player to score in four straight matches was Stephanie Erickson -- currently a Wildcat assistant -- in 1997.
* Hans is the first player in NU history to score in each of her first two collegiate matches.
