Nov. 1, 2015
By Jack Dougherty, GoPSUsports.com Student Staff Writer
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. ââ'¬" The Penn State women's soccer team opened up the Big Ten Tournament in a strong way with a convincing 3-1 victory over the Fighting Illini of Illinois on Sunday afternoon.
The Nittany Lions, who secured the No. 1 seed on the final day of the regular season, took advantage of having a home field edge with some help from the rowdy Penn State faithful. The Park Avenue Army and friends were amped up and ready to go early, as were the Nittany Lions.
"Home field advantage is huge. It's what you work for all year," said head coach Erica Walsh. "We stressed to the team the importance of getting each of these results in conference and out of conference so we can continue to protect Jeffery Field."
After a flurry of chances right out of the gate, the Nittany Lions finally broke the seal in the 27th minute.
Mallory Weber started the attack with a great hustle play to save the ball from going out of bounds near the Illinois bench. Her cross found sophomore forward Megan Schafer in the box, who spun around a defender and passed off to junior Nickolette Driesse on the left side. Driesse, with no Illini defenders in sight, took a few dribbles and beat the charging goalie far side to put Penn State up, 1-0.
Driesse hasn't been the premier goal-scorer for the Nittany Lions this year, but she's been turning it on of late. She has scored in each of the past two games to bring her 2015 goal total to three.
"She's flying high right now," Walsh said. "She's playing with as much confidence as we've seen all season long. You hope that as the season goes on they get better. She's been in and out of the lineup a little bit, but it didn't faze her and now she's playing some of her best soccer of the season."
Penn State struck again just six minutes later, this time courtesy of Weber. Off a corner kick, the senior captain found the back of the net with her head after the ball bounced off the crossbar and back into play. The goal marked Weber's eighth of the season and 36th of her career.
Shortly after Penn State opened up a two-goal lead, Frannie Crouse decided to get in on the action. In the 41st minute, the sophomore received a perfect pass from freshman Charlotte Williams in the middle of the box and snuck her attempt past the diving keeper to stretch Penn State's early lead to three.
Crouse, who led Penn State in goals a year ago, had a quiet month of October, but she can get hot at any moment. And now would be the perfect time for Crouse to do just that.
"It was all just in my mind," Crouse said. "Mentally I had to get out of it and today since I scored I feel a little better about myself. Hopefully November will be my month."
"Frannie Crouse deserved her goal today," said Walsh. "She's been working for the last couple days to get it. She's a threat every time she touches the ball and thankfully she got back on the board today."
Penn State outshot Illinois 19-9 in the contest, highlighted by a 15-1 advantage in the first half. The Nittany Lions improved to 13-0 on the season when netting the first goal of the game.
The Nittany Lions will face the Michigan Wolverines in the Big Ten semifinals on Friday at Jeffery Field. Penn State defeated the Wolverines 3-1 in the regular season finale last week.