Head Coach Lisa Cellucci may have been under the weather and not in attendance at this weekend’s games, but the Iowa Field Hockey team did not miss a beat. The defense stifled the 22nd ranked UMass Minutewomen on the offensive side and the Hawkeyes picked up a 2-0 victory on Sunday afternoon.

“We wanted to improve from Friday. We felt like we did some good things against Providence, but a few details got away from us,” said Associate Head Coach Michael Boal. “We feel like we put together a more complete performance today.”

Senior Anthe Nijziel felt this was one of their best performances of the year so far. “I think this is the most complete game we have put on the field (this year)…Defensively, it was a lot more organized, and we had some great passes stringing up the field.”

Coming into the game, UMass was averaging 15.4 shots and 9.2 shots on goal per game, but the Hawkeye defense shut them down. The Minutewomen were not able challenge Grace McGuire at any point and were not credited with a single shot for the entire game.

“That’s the platform from which we build from,” said Coach Boal. “That was one of the things from Friday to today that really improved and got better.”

On offense, Iowa got on the board in the 3rd minute courtesy of an Anthe Nijziel laser past UMass goalie Myrte Van Hervijnen. The goal came off a penalty corner opportunity and gave the Hawkeyes the early advantage.

The Hawkeyes held a 1-0 lead into the third quarter and despite the exceptional defensive play, a one goal lead was not safe against a ranked opponent. In the final minute of the third quarter, Esme Gibson used some skillful stickwork to get into the scoring circle and while her shot was saved by Van Herwijnen, it deflected right to Alex Wesneski and she put it into the back of the net to make it 2-0. Wesneski has scored in five of six games this season and has a team leading seven goals.

Despite the 2-0 victory, the Hawkeyes left some opportunities out on the field in the form of penalty corner chances. Over the last three games, Iowa was 7/17 (41.2%) on converting penalty corners, but today they were just 1/9 (11.1%).

“We did a good job and put together some good combinations. We had multiple opportunities. We could have probably gotten another one or two goals with the opportunities we had,” said Coach Boal. “At the same time, we’re getting good opportunities and that’s the thing that is going to help us moving forward.”