November 2
Yesterday was our Senior Day against SUNY Cortland and our 3-2 overtime victory was a perfect ending to my career - although with the win, it is possible that the season might not be over. In my four years at Vassar, we have emerged from overtime games with some heartbreaking losses and ties, so to finally get an overtime win on Senior Day was incredibly redeeming. In my career here, we have also never made the playoffs, but one strike from Brian Bianchetti in the first overtime period of yesterday’s game may have changed that. Bianchetti’s goal off a perfect flick-on from Jon Hootnick gave us our first overtime victory in 10 tries and also qualified us for the ECAC playoffs with an 8-8 overall record. While we will not hear until after next weekend’s conference tournaments whether we have been selected, Saturday’s win kept alive our hopes of playing a first-round playoff game next Wednesday.
Yesterday’s game was the final home game for myself and our five other seniors (Jason Cetel, Kevin Goldberg, Danny Kadishson, Matt Belli and Jon Hootnick). We were all in the starting line-up for the game, and I made my first-ever start up top since Cetel is also a goalkeeper. It has been a tough season for Jason but he saved one of his best performances for last as he made a handful of difficult saves to keep us in the game. While we fell behind late in the first half, we came out firing in the second half and grabbed two quick goals- the first a difficult chip shot by Hootnick and the second a finish from sophomore Ben Scaglione after a great combination from Hootnick and Ross Macklin. Still, we could not hold onto the lead, as Cortland answered through striker Bryan Patterson, who has scored three goals against us in two games. Patterson sprinted past our defense for an easy breakaway goal, setting up Bianchetti’s overtime heroics.
After four years of ups and downs, it was really important for our class to go out on a high note, and we certainly did that on Saturday. Games like that one remind you why you play college athletics; all the difficult practices and heart-breaking losses never hurt as much as the exciting victories feel good. Now we need to hope we are selected for the ECAC tournament, and if we are, hopefully we can build off of this performance. We needed to rebound from a disappointing loss to New Paltz on Wednesday and I think we played more relaxed on Saturday and had fun defeating a very strong team from Cortland. We will surely be underdogs if we advance to the ECAC tournament but this could be an advantage as I think we can surprise some teams.
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1 comment:
I agree very much with your statement that being an underdog can be an advantage. If you remember back to last year's Superbowl, the Patriots were an undefeated 18-0 going into the game, while the Giants were a measly 13-6. The Patriots were a colossal 12 point favorite in the game. And need I say more? We all know how that game turned out.
Mc(Cain)Cumber for Prez.
<3. B.
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