O'Brien Leads Field Hockey to 4-2 Win at St. Anselm
Manchester, N.H. - In what was essentially a must-win game, the Bryant Field Hockey team responded with four unanswered goals in 20 minutes in the second half to prevail with a 4-2 win over St. Anselm Thursday afternoon.
Courtney O'Brien (Tewksbury, Mass.) led the way with one goal and two assists, while co-captain Laynie Sadler (Rehoboth, Mass.) added a goal and an assist.
After being dominated and outshot 5-1 in the first half and outscored 1-0, the Bulldogs woke up just 1:19 into the second half when freshman Caitlan Johnson (Walpole, Mass.) blasted a shot past St.Anselm goaltender Riley Haddock off a Sadler corner pass. It was Johnson's sixth tally of the year.
Sadler gave the Bulldogs the lead two-minutes later, with O'Brien setting her up beautifully for her eighth goal of the season.
Sadler's streak of consecutive points on Bryant goals would end at 12 straight Bulldog goals when Shana Libman (Attleboro, Mass.) made it 3-1 in the 46th minute, scoring off another corner, that was caused by senior co-captain Michaela Dwyer (Buskirk, N.Y.) drawing the foul. O'Brien notched the assist.
O'Brien put the game away ten minutes later, getting her own rebound and putting it past Haddock to make it 4-1.
Kundayi Mawema (Hare, Zimbabwe) kept the Bulldogs close in the first half and finished with six saves. The Bulldogs outshot St. Anselm 11-7 in the second half.
With the win, Bryant (7-7, 6-5 NE-10) retained possession of the sixth and final playoff spot in the Northeast-10. The Bulldogs will host seventh-ranked UMass-Lowell Saturday night (7 p.m.) at the Bryant Turf Complex.