Today: Mar 28, 2024

Field Hockey taking it ‘one win at a time’

Edward RudmanSports Writer

As teams continue to practice in the fall, working to polish their skills and get ready for a potentially sports filled spring semester, field hockey is no different.

“Practice has definitely been a little different, especially not having the whole team there but we’ve even doing the best we can with it,” said player Megan Habakangas, a senior. “We’ve been starting to work on more group activities like getting into formations, passing to each other and working on our communication.”

The program currently has multiple members on its team that made the decision to forego living on campus this semester and train with the team remotely from home, adding a new dynamic to this semesters training period.

The team has primarily focused on the foundations of the sport, such as stick skills, fundamentals, and technique, according to Head Coach Kelly Frassinelli.

“We’ve incorporated our off campus athletes by bringing them in through the computer. Really just keeping them engaged, it’s a matter of how we respond to what their needs are,” said Coach Frassinelli. “Practicing everyday for two hours out on the field is just not feasible in this time so we’ve been trying to get the most out of it.”

The team, looking to improve upon last season, finished 1-16 overall last year and 1-13 in Northeast 10 conference play. Their victory came against NE10 foe Molloy College, beating them 4-1. Last season was an improvement from the prior, as they did not win any games in 2018 and finished 0-18 overall.

One of the more focused on aspects of this semester is making sure the freshman get acclimated to the program when it is not operating at full strength and ability.

Jessica Maier, a Senior, is currently one of the members of the team that is training remotely from home and spoke about the training this semester and the logistics of it all.

“During phase one, it was really easy to do what everyone else was doing and as it progressed more into the deeper phases and more stick skills became involved, I quickly realized that it was not the same as being with the team. So I decided to come back and I’ve only been to one practice so far before athletics were shut down last week but I plan on going to the rest of the practices in person,” said Maier.

Looking ahead, the semester is nearing its end and the team will continue to work on what they can and further polish their skills. When the spring rolls around and a potential competitive season begins, the field hockey program will be ready to show how much they’ve improved.

Coach Frassinelli said, “Of course everyone wants to win a championship, but for us, it’s more about the more attainable goals, you know. One win at a time, how we’re making plays on the field and how we connect. One of our strengths a couple years ago was our passing game and it’s kind of come away from that so I’d like to return to that. I’d like to get back to those connections happening all the time and it’ll create all those opportunities for scoring and winning and maybe a championship.”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

Latest from Blog