The calendar flips to November, which means the field hockey season flips from the regular season to the postseason. The Iowa Field Hockey team is preparing to take on the Michigan Wolverines in the opening round of the Big Ten Tournament on Thursday and they are treating it as a blank slate with the regular season behind them.

“It’s cliché, but everybody is 0-0 and it’s a new slate for us,” said Head Coach Lisa Cellucci at practice on Sunday morning. “We have the opportunity to reset…We’ve had great success in previous Big Ten Tournament, so we feel confident going in.”

“Everyone has a fresh slate when they go into the tournament. Anyone can win,” said Esme Gibson.

For the Hawkeyes, this year’s Big Ten Tournament has a different feel compared to recent years. The last couple of seasons, they have used the tournament to try to lock up a NCAA host spot or improve their seed. This year, their NCAA Tournament hopes could rest on the outcome of Thursday’s matchup against the Wolverines. A win would almost ensure an at-large bid, while a loss would mean a long wait until Sunday night’s Selection Show.

“It’s crunch time. It’s all the marbles in one basket,” said senior goalkeeper Grace McGuire. “I’m just hoping that everybody else feels that pressure. Pressure is a good thing. I enjoy it.”

“I do think, if we do happen to lose, there is still a possibility for an at-large because of our body of work compared to everybody else,” said Cellucci. “We’re going into it like we have to win.”

Last Friday, Iowa was able to snap a three-game losing streak in the season finale with a 1-0 victory over Michigan State. While the Spartans finished 1-7 in conference play and missed out on this week’s tournament in Columbus, the Hawkeyes made some adjustments to their structure. It led to better passing, a more balanced attack, more penalty corners and their first goal in over three games. They are trying to take the positive momentum from Friday and have it carry over into this week’s contest.

“I think especially since last week, we’ve been having some great practices and we’re focusing on things that we can improve on,” said senior Anthe Nijziel. “It’s been good, so we’re carrying that over into this week.”

“We just needed to get the monkey off our back and get some momentum going forward no matter the score,” said Cellucci. “We felt good about the performance, so just excited to get to practice again.”

The matchup against Michigan has become a common one over the last couple of weeks. It will be the third game between the two teams in a three-week span with the Wolverines winning the first two games. The Hawkeyes were outshot 40-7, including a 25-6 advantage for Michigan in shots on goal. They will have their work cut out for them, but the team is excited to get another shot at the Wolverines.

“I wasn’t sure how they were going to react to it,” said Coach Cellucci. “They were like “let’s go, we want another shot.’”

The thing that makes the matchup against Michigan uniquely difficult is their ability to push their forwards down the field and put pressure on the defenders. It slows down a team’s ability to build the ball up the field and any mistakes by the backs can lead to a quick counter from the forwards.

“Their press is really good. They were able to do a really good job of taking away our outside midfielders and forcing us to outlet in a way we didn’t want to, and we have worked on that for two weeks now,” said Grace McGuire. “They have a really deep line in terms of their forwards, so they are able to get a lot of rotation and a lot of fresh legs.

Grace says she has to be on alert at all times against a team like Michigan because a turnover from the Hawkeye defense can quickly turn into a 1v1 situation where she has to make a save.

“Had a couple of those last Sunday. They’re killer in transition,” said Grace. “Definitely just have to be ultra-aware at all times. Who has the ball and where they’re entering the circle from. Pretty much locked in the whole game.”

The Hawkeyes know that decision making with the ball will be the key on Thursday. There won’t be very many passes made with no pressure and any mistakes could be costly. Before the Iowa offense can get shots on goal and earn penalty corners, the backs and midfielders have to build the attack from back to front.

“We’re trying to just connect some of the shorter passes and the longer ones, that’s what they’re trying to take away from us,” said Anthe Nijziel.

“First and foremost, it’s just basic skill execution and then being able to use our structure to our advantage,” said Coach Cellucci. “In the midfield, we have to be able to continue to build the ball with short, small passes, rather than always trying to play long on Michigan because they are fantastic interceptors.”

On Friday against Michigan State, the Hawkeyes were able to control possession, pass well and had a number of chances to score more than one goal, but just were not able to capitalize. However, Esme Gibson said that it’s a positive that the opportunities were available and that they can look at what went wrong and fix it.

“We had a lot of really close opportunities on goal…Having 12 (penalty corners) showed that we do have an offense and we can win those corners, which is great.”

Iowa currently sits at #8 in the RPI rankings and would be the 5th highest at-large team if the season ended today. In the KPI rankings, Iowa is #12 and is the 8th highest at-large team. Of course, the selection committee makes their own decisions, but they are influenced heavily by the two rating systems. Ten teams will earn automatic bids and an additional eight teams will receive at-large bids to the NCAA Tournament. The Hawkeyes matchup against Michigan is set for 10:00am on Thursday and will be streamed on BTN+.