The Michigan Daily - SportsMonday - November 11, 2002 - 7B Spartans deny dual titles for 'M' stickers IELD HocKEY I i"F COLUMBUS CONFERENCE Stickers can't find their touch on penalty corners By Brian Steere Daily Sports Writer COLUMBUS - All season long, the Michigan field hockey team has pros- pered during penalty-corner situations. This past weekend in the Big Ten Tour- nament, they became the Wolverines' Achilles' heel. Despite earning 19 penalty-corners in FIELD HOCKEY two games, Michigan Notebook managed to convert on just one occasion. In addition, it surrendered four goals on just 10 opportunities by Ohio State and Michigan State. Forward Molly Powers indicated that penalty corners are a difficult play to set up, and executing one requires everyone being on the same page. "It's a very detailed, set play," Powers said. "The push-out has to be perfect, then the stick-stop and the strike, and whatever extra skills are added to it. It's a lot of components that have to be working well, and if one is off, the whole corner can be called off." Annebet Beerman, who was named co-MVP of the tournament along with the Spartans' goalkeeper Christina Kirkaldy, netted five penalty-corner goals over the weekend, including two against the Wolverines. "Both of them were great shots," Michigan coach Marcia Pankratz said. "We tried to limit the corners they got, and I thought we did limit their corners quite well; because they've got great skilled players and the fact that we lim- ited it (to four) was pretty good." In addition to Beerman's prowess on penalty corners, Ohio State midfielder Mariana Solorzano was also an incredi- ble force. She beat Michigan goalkeeper Molly Maloney on two of the Buckeyes' six opportunities and had one controver- sial attempt ruled too high. "Mariana's got the hardest hit in the nation," Pankratz said. "It's just impos- sible to stop if she's on fire." PAYBACK: Michigan State's victory in yesterday's final snapped its nine-game losing streak against Michigan. Over the past two seasons, the Wolverines have had a knack for handing the Spartans crushing defeats. In addition to its thrilling 1-0 regular-season victory this year, Michigan earned two sensational wins against Michigan State last season, including a 2-1 overtime decision in the NCAA regional final. Michigan "brings out the best in us," Michigan State coach Michelle Madison said. "The team really looks forward to playing Michigan. It's always a heart- breaker. As hard as it hurt in the past, that's how glorious it is right now." GRUDGE MATCH: Michigan and Michi- gan State might be facing each other again sooner than they would like. Tomorrow evening, the NCAA will release the 16-team bracket for the upcoming tournament, which begins this weekend at campus sites. Despite their high rankings, 'the Spartans and Wolverines could easily end up in the same region for the first two rounds. "It's a brand new season," Pankratz said. "Michigan State's a great team and Forwards exploit seams in defense By Brian Schick Daily Sports Writer COLUMBUS - One of the strengths of the Michigan field hockey offense is its ability to find seams in oppo- nents' defenses, which allows it to capitalize on defensive mistakes. Saturday, the Wolverines used their uncanny passing ability to frustrate the Ohio State defenders in a 3- 2 victory. The majority of the game saw action in the Buckeyes' end, with numerous scoring opportunities in the circle. This resulted in 10 penalty corners opportunities for Michigan, a sign that the team is working hard in the opponent's zone. "Our forwards are quick and dangerous," Michigan coach Marcia Pankratz said. "When we put a lot of pressure on them, it wreaks a lot of havoc for their defenders." The Wolverines forced numerous turnovers in the Buck- eyes' end as a result of the constant pressure, and spread the ball all over the field to keep the passing lanes open. "We know they like to go to the side with the ball, and they kind of crowd our players," midfielder Jessica Rose said. "Since they come in groups, we knew our transfer would be on." Two of Michigan's goals exploited these openings in the Ohio State defense, and resulted in breakaways for both goal scorers. Forward Molly Powers received a pass from a defender and raced down the sideline, drawing two defend- ers towards her. With an extra defender covering Powers, she slipped a pass to an open April Fronzoni, who walked in on the goalkeeper untouched and buried her shot. "I knew (Fronzoni) was (open) the whole way," Powers said. "I was holding onto the ball to make the defender commit to me, and April was holding the outside beautiful- ly." Powers and Fronzoni have worked all season on antici- pating each other's actions and finding the right time to expect a pass from the other, and as a result, they are the top two point scorers on the team - Fronzoni with 40 and Powers with 32. "April and I read off each other really well," Powers said. "I knew she was open, and I was confident in her that she could finish the play." TOM FELDKMI Michigan State players celebrate their first Big Ten Tournament title in school history, ending a streak of seven tournament failures. so are we. It will be interesting to see if we have to play each other in regionals or if we'll be split up. We should be split up, and I hope (the NCAA is) smart enough to do that. CLEAN SWEEP: At last Thursday's Big Ten Awards banquet in Columbus, Michigan took home all five regular- season awards. Junior forward April Fronzoni was named the league's athlete and offensive player of the year, while junior defender Stephanie Johnson earned the Defensive Player of the Year honor. The conference's Freshman of the Year award went to defender Lori Hill- man, and Pankratz was honored as the Big Ten Coach of the Year. In addition to Fronzoni and Johnson, defender Kristi Gannon made the All- Big Ten first team. Forward Jessica Rose snagged All-Big Ten second team honors. SPARTANS Continued from Page 1B the game, with several potential scoring chances being spoiled by Spartan defenders. The defense limited the Wolverines to 14 shots in the game and denied Michigan on all nine of its penalty corners. "We didn't capitalize on our chances," Spartans play good ball Michigan State won its first field hockey Big Ten Tournamnet this weekend, ending its dismal performances in previous years. Game1: Michigan State 3, Indiana 0 The Spartans jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first two minutes, and dominated the Hoosiers by allowing just three shots on goal. Game 2: Michigan State 3, Penn State 2 After. all the problems on the penalty corner the day before, Michigan State scored all three of its goals off penalty corners in the first half. Game 3: Michigan State 3, Michigan 0 Michigan State stifled Michigan's forwards, and shut out the Wolverines for just the second time this season. Michigan coach Marcia Pankratz said. "We needed to counter-attack a little bit better and we weren't able to do that today." The Spartans jumped out to an early lead by working hard in the circle, and scored on a well-executed penalty corner to give Michigan State the lead in the first half. But the turning point came when midfielder Jessica Rose received a yellow card with 30 minutes to go in the second half, forcing the Wolverines to play short-handed. "I think the momentum shifted when (Rose) got yellow carded," Pankratz said. Less than two minutes later, Michigan State forward Michelle Huynh-Ba lifted a shot from just inside the circle that flew over the shoul- der of goalkeeper Molly Maloney to give the Spartans a comfortable two-goal lead. Michi- gan State added another tally on a penalty cor- ner to secure the title. While the Spartans were able to capitalize on their penalty corner opportunities, Michi- gan couldn't find the touch. The Wolverines had two corners in the final 10 minutes, but failed to convert on either of them. "Their corners were on and ours weren't," Powers said. "We had our opportunities and they didn't fall today. We ran a couple of balls over the endline when we should have had them on our stick in the circle. We didn't con- vert when we needed to." Michigan State's win ends a string of nine straight victories by the Wolverines dating back to 1997. The Spartans also ended their streak of futility at the Big Ten Tournament. Since the tournament began in 1994, the Spar- tans held a 1-7 record. Their lone victory came against Iowa in 1997. "Anytime we play Michigan, we know it makes us better," Michigan State coach Michelle Madison said. "Michigan is always a great team." For as much difficulty as Michigan had finding openings in the Spartans' defense, they were much easier to find against Ohio State. The Buckeyes (2-4, 8-10) had trouble stopping the wide-open Michigan offense, as it scored two goals off excellent passes. Rose stole a restart pass away from a Buckeye defender and fed a cross-field pass to Powers, who walked in all alone. "Powers said at halftime to look up to the left because she felt she was open," Rose said. "When I looked up, I saw Powers coming and sent the ball right to her." The Wolverines will wait to see who they face this coming weekend, as the NCAA Tour- nament bracket will be unveiled on tomorrow. TOM FELDKAMP/Daily Midfielder Laura Woltkewitsch and the Wolverines couldn't find their momentum in the 3-0 loss to Michigan State in the Big Ten Tournamnet championship game yesterday. Spikers drop to fourth in Big Ten standings pAC.CC)... By Mike Wolking For the Daily Coming off a four-game win streak that saw it defeat two ranked foes, the Michigan volleyball team faced a crucial road trip this weekend. But instead of capitalizing on an opportunity to hold' on to their second-place position in the Big Ten, the Wolverines hurt themselves with losses at Ohio State and Indiana. "We could have won both games," coach Mark Rosen said. "We just didn't control the ball very well." Part of the problem may have been the injury to junior Chantel Reedus. The outside hitter wasn't completely healthy and couldn't play at 100 percent in either matchup. In Bloomington, the Wolverines lost a tough five-game match. After dropping the first game 30-19, Michigan regrouped and took the next two 31-29 and 30-26. But the Hoosiers would rally and eventually claim victory after narrowly pulling out game five 15-13. "Indiana is really balanced. Like us, they don't really rely on just one or two players to get it done," Rosen said. " They ran their offense pretty well too. "We broke down a little bit at the end, and we just couldn't put it away. In the fifth game we beat them statistically, but with five unforced errors it's tough to beat anybody." One bright spot for the Wolverines was the play of Carrie Ritchie, featured in the front row for the first time this season. The sophomore had her first double-double of the year, with 12 kills and 14 digs. She also added a team high three service aces. Last week's Big Ten Player of the Week, Jen- nifer Gandolph, had 21 kills, while sophomore setter Lisa Gamalski efficiently ran the offense with 63 assists. On Friday night, Michigan sought its first ever victory in Columbus, but left empty-handed once again. Ohio State has had some injury problems this year, but the Buckeyes'showed no signs of weakness, winning 3-1. "Ohio State always has a good team. They just played really well and they're finally healthy, too," Rosen said. With the two losses, Michigan is now tied with the Hoosiers for fourth place in the Big Ten standings. But Rosen is optimistic about the rest of the season, especially since four of Michi- gan's six remaining games are at Cliff Keen Arena. "All of them are winnable," he said. "The con- ference is still wide open." Bonds struggles as All-Stars fall to Japanese TOKYO (AP) - Barry Bonds opened a seven-game all-star series with one of his worst games in one- and-a-half years. Bonds struck out three times as the major league all-stars lost to their Japanese counterparts 8-4 yes- terday in the opener of their exhibi- tion series. Bonds, who homered twice Satur- day against the Japanese champion Yomiuri Giants, fanned three times against Yomiuri right-hander Koji Uehara, who also struck out Jason Giambi twice. During the regular season, Bonds has not struck out three times in a game since Aug. 8, 2001 - when he was called out three times a against Cincinnati and argued with Giambi, who also homered twice Saturday "He threw it hard enough that you couldn't sit on it and he made quality pitches all night." Uehara allowed a solo homer in the fifth to Minnesota's Torii Hunter. "I really wanted the win," Uehara said. "It felt great to strike out Bonds and Giambi. The only mis- take I made was that slider to Hunter." Hideki Matsui hit a two-run dou- ble off Florida's Brad Penny as Japan went ahead in a five-run third. Matsui, who wants to play in the major leagues, is a free agent and can start negotiating with all teams starting 10 a.m. EST Tuesday. Matsui went 1-for-4 Saturday in in the seventh off Philadelphia's Randy Wolf for a 6-1 lead. "I didn't hold anything back," Cabrera said. "Everybody is really excited about this series and I was happy to contribute." Norihiro Nakamura of the Kintet- su Buffaloes and Yoshitomo Tani of the Orix BlueWave both hit RBI singles in the seventh to make it 8- 1. The Japanese all-stars had 18 hits - including 15 singles - off Penny, Wolf, Mike Fetters and Scott Schoeneweis. Penny, who allowed a go-ahead third-inning homer to Hanshin's Makoto Imaoka, gave up five runs and eight hits in 2 2-3 innings and was the loser. Oakland's Eric Chavez hit an RBI double in the ninth off Yasuhiro Oyamada, and Minnesota's A.J. Pierzynski and Jacque Jones hit RBI grounders. rOOL' FOR 'HOIJG-T HOW TO PROTEST If you wish to create a legacy f or your gen- eration, specifically regarding the Iraq sit- uation, then protests are i,n order. Demand that Saddam Hussein open his country to unre- stricted inspections. Also, demand that the United Nations draft resolutions, with teeth, that require such inspections. If you do that you may prevent war, while making the world a safer place to live. If you protest against our own government, you will do what the Viet- nam protestors did; encourage the enemy to hang on long enough to win, despite battlefield Do you- Have Acne? Tf %ini i hwo nr^nc vnm i may m mlifii fnr an invcictinatinnni ch irly