Polar Bears Claim Seventh Field Hockey Championship

Courtesy Bowdoin Sports Information

Box Score

BRUNSWICK, Maine - Liz Clegg scored the game-winning goal with 1:48 remaining to give the Bowdoin College field hockey team its seventh NESCAC championship on Sunday at Ryan Field, 2-1, over Middlebury College.

The top-seeded Polar Bears improve to 17-0 this season and stretch the nation's longest winning streak to 24 consecutive matches. Bowdoin earns the NESCAC's automatic bid to the Division III Tournament while Middlebury (14-3) will likely receive an at-large bid when the field is announced on Sunday evening.

Middlebury owned most of the possession in the early-going, forcing Bowdoin's defense to come up with some big stops. Elena Crosley picked up a defensive save for the Polar Bears and goaltender Kayla Lessard came off her line to make a sliding stop on a shot by NESCAC leading-scorer Lauren Greer midway through the period. Bowdoin replied with some pressure downfield, but came away empty when a shot by Kassey Matoin rang off the post to keep the game scoreless heading into intermission.

Both teams broke into the scoring column on their first shots of the second half. Bowdoin's came nine minutes into the period off a penalty corner as Clegg delivered the insert to Matoin, who placed it for Ella Curren. Curren blasted a low shot inside the left post to give the Polar Bears the lead with 25:25 to go. Middlebury answered seven minutes later when Catherine Fowler intercepted a Bowdoin clearing attempt, walked into the top of the circle and rifled a low shot past Lessard to even the score with 18:25 to go.

The teams traded possession in midfield for the majority of the remainder of regulation until the Polar Bears garnered a pair of late corner attempts. With under two minutes to go, the ball was played into the Middlebury defensive circle. An initial shot attempt bounced off the leg pads of goaltender Becca Shaw and came to the waiting stick of Clegg, who swatted home the loose ball with 1:48 remaining to give Bowdoin its sixth NESCAC crown in the last seven years.

Lessard made seven saves in net for Bowdoin while Becca Shaw stopped six shots for Middlebury. The Panthers held a 15-14 edge in shots. Bowdoin earned an 11-9 edge in penalty corners.

The defending national champions improve to 16-1 in NESCAC Tournament play over the last seven years, including a 6-0 mark in conference title matches and 3-0 record in title games against Middlebury.

2011 NESCAC FIELD HOCKEY CHAMPIONSHIP
Quarterfinals - Saturday, October 29 at Higher Seeds
at No. 1 Bowdoin 2, No. 8 Hamilton 0
at No. 2 Amherst 3, No. 7 Wesleyan 1
at No. 3 Middlebury 3, No. 6 Williams 0
No. 5 Trinity 2, at No. 4 Tufts 1 - 2OT

Semifinals - Saturday, November 5 at Bowdoin
at No. 1 Bowdoin 2, No. 5 Trinity 0
No. 3 Middlebury 2, vs. No. 2 Amherst 1 - OT

Championship - Sunday, November 6 at Bowdoin
at No. 1 Bowdoin 2, No. 3 Middlebury 1

2011 NESCAC FIELD HOCKEY CHAMPIONSHIP

Quarterfinals - Saturday, October 29 at Higher Seeds
1:00 p.m.
No. 8 at No. 1
No. 7 at No. 2
No. 6 at No. 3
No. 5 at No. 4

Semifinals - Saturday, November 5 at Highest Remaining Seed
11:00 a.m./1:30 p.m.
  Highest Remaining Seed vs. Lowest Remaining Seed
Remaining First Round Winners

Championship - Sunday, November 6
Semifinal Winners - 12:00 p.m.

Format
The top eight teams in the conference will qualify for the NESCAC Field Hockey Championship.  Quarterfinal games will be conducted on Saturday, October 29, 2011 with the semifinals and championship games conducted on Saturday, November 5 and Sunday, November 6, respectively.  The tournament champion will receive an automatic bid to the NCAA Division III Championship. 

Seeding
Seeding will be based on final conference standings of round robin play. Standings will be based on team winning percentages. Ties shall count as half a win.

The 8th seed will play at the 1st seed, the 7th seed will play at the 2nd seed, the 6th seed will play at the 3rd seed, and the 5th seed will play at the 4th seed.  Teams will be re-bracketed after first round games and the lowest remaining seed will face the highest remaining seed.

Pairings
Pairings will be announced Wednesday, October 26.

Tie Breaking Procedures
Ties will be broken as follows:

Head-to-head result (if teams play each other more than once during the regular season, the game that appears on the league schedule will be the game that is counted).

If teams tied during the regular season, or there is a 3-way or more tie, the following tie breaking procedure will be used:

• Best record among tying teams, against one another (head-to-head).
• Most conference wins (in games that are part of the conference schedule and count toward league standings).
• Comparison of results of conference games played against top 4 teams (including all teams at the 4th spot).
• Comparison of results of conference games played against top 8 teams (including all teams at the 8th spot).
• Comparison of results of conference games played against conference teams in rank order.
• Comparisons shall be made one team at a time starting with the highest ranked team.
• If the tie remains after comparing results against the highest ranked team, the results against the next team in rank order shall be used. This process is continued until a winner is determined.
• Coin flip (or similar random action involving all tied teams).

Note: In case of ties among three or more schools, the criteria above will be applied in order until a team is (or teams are) separated.  At that point, the process begins anew (returning to the first criteria) with the remaining teams.  The process is continued until the tie is eventually broken.  In cases where only a random action will break the tie of three or more teams, the random action will be applied to all teams involved in the tie.  For example, if three teams are tied and only a random action (pulling names out of a hat) will break the tie, each name will be pulled and seeded in order of being pulled.  Also, in the event that there are two (or more) groups of teams tied at different spots in the standings and the only criteria left that can be used to break those ties is a coin flip/random action, the coin flip/random action used to break the tie of one group (to put teams in rank order) will not affect the tie breaking procedures of the other group(s) of tied teams.