Nov. 2, 2007
Columbus, Ohio - Penn State battled back to take a 2-1 lead early in the second half after it had trailed for most of the first half but Michigan tied the game with just under 13 minutes remaining in regulation and then, in the sixth minute of overtime, scored a short-handed goal to defeat the Nittany Lions 3-2 in overtime in the semifinals of the Big Ten Tournament. Penn State falls to 13-7 overall with the loss and will now await the NCAA Tournament selection show next Tuesday to find out it gets an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.
In the overtime, Michigan's Lucia Belassi was assessed a yellow card at the 73:55 mark. With Michigan then playing a player down, it was awarded a penalty corner. After the first shot off the corner was saved by Jen Beaumont, Stephanie Hoyer pounced on the rebound in the middle of the circle and one-timed the ball past a sprawled out Beaumont and out of her reach into the lower left corner of the goal.
Penn State, which had to play without Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year Jen Long for the final minutes of the second half and the overtime after she left with a muscle cramp, outshot Michigan 9-8 in the game and in both halves but Michigan held the upper hand in shots in the overtime by a 4-1 margin. Michigan had four penalty corners to just two for the Nittany Lions but the Wolverines used three of those four corners to directly or indirectly score their three goals.
The Wolverines got on the scoreboard first just 4:52 into the game on their only shot of the first half. It came off a penalty corner as Ashley Lennington tipped in a ball off the stick of Belassi, who had taken the intial shot off the corner. It was wide to the right but was redirected in by Lennington in-between Beaumont and the right post to make it 1-0.
The Nittany Lions had a few chances in the first half as they took three shots to just the one for Michigan and also had two penalty corners to just the one for the Wolverines but were unable to convert. Penn State also sent a handful of centering passes that went through circle but no sticks were able to redirect them into the cage in the first half.
In the second half, Penn State once again held the upper hand on the offensive end, generating several scoring chances of its own while the defense was able to quickly kill away Michigan's scoring chances for the better part of the first half of the second half. In the meantime, the Nittany Lions were able to take the lead. They tied the score just over three minutes into the second half at the 38:38 mark as Allison Scola one-timed a ball high into the cage on a second-chance opportunity. Britney Long had gotten off an initial shot from the right side of the circle and the rebound came out to Scola, who was at the top of the circle. She then unleashed a shot that beat Michigan keeper Paige Pickett high and to the upper left corner of the goal.
Penn State took a 2-1 lead at the 44:38 mark on a goal that was started by Scola from the top of the circle once again. The Nittany Lions were awarded a free hit from just outside the top of the circle and Scola took the hit and put the ball just to the right of the cage and right to the stick of Britney Long, who redirected the ball past Pickett for her third goal of the tournament.
After Penn State retained possession and had most of the offensive chances in the first part of the second half, it was the Wolverines that had the more chances in the latter part of the second half and one of those produced the game-tying goal at the 57:27 mark. A penalty corner produced the chance and Kristen Tiner converted on the shot off the corner to tie the game 2-2.
Michigan was awarded a penalty corner just before the end of regulation but the shot off the corner was wide, sending the game to overtime.
Michigan, which had defeated Penn State earlier in the year 1-0 in a game that did not go to overtime, had gone to overtime in four of its other five Big Ten games, winning them all. This marked the second straight year that Penn State went to overtime in the semifinal of the Big Ten Tournament. Last year, the Nittany Lions came out on the winning side, topping Michigan State in overtime.
Next Tuesday's NCAA selection show will be televised by CSTV at 8:00 p.m. The first and second rounds will be held at campus sites to be announced next Saturday and Sunday.
Head coach Charlene Morett postgame quotes
On the game
"We played with a very high level of intensity today in what was a very physical game. We fought through a lot of that. They obviously had two cards. It's very disappointing to lose the way we did but I felt our team played very hard. It was a well-fought game. We had chances and we needed to capitalize a bit more when we had those chances. It was a great comeback by us coming back (in the second half). Michigan has just found a way to win every game in overtime this year against conference opponents and for another one to go down today is just unfortunate for us. It was tough playing without Jen Long there (at the end of the second half and the overtime). We'll just have to regroup."
On the performance today vs. the performance against Michigan in the first game
"We played much better today than we did the first time against Michigan. I felt we got tentative in the second half the first time when we needed to keep being aggressive but today we played very aggressive for the entire game and played at a high level."