Shippensburg takes down Mansfield 4-3 in overtime

“I think it was difficult,” freshman Agus Garibaldi said, who was just named PSAC (Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference) field hockey player of the week. She added two more goals and an assist Wednesday at Robb Sports Complex to her offensive resume.

“We weren’t scoring on our corners,” Garibaldi said. “We need to continue to have an attitude for how we are looking at the game and then win.”

From forwards down the line, Ship Coach Tara Zollinger said “tougher defense” is in the practice plans.

“We also need to be able to consistently play all four quarters,” she said. “The first quarter was fantastic. We were doing what we needed to do and then it kind of dropped there.”

It was good for the young Raiders team – 8 new players – to be tested with a different style of defense. Jedeloo described circle play as “gritty.” 

“They drop everyone behind the ball,” Zollinger said. “So, you’re defending with a lot of feet in the circle. I would have liked for us to earn more attack penalty corners because they had everyone underneath the ball. So, we kept forcing the ball into them and the center of the field and it just wasn’t working.”

The Mountaineers’ stance is “packing the middle and forcing wide,” said Coach Brittany Hansrote. She said she tries to cultivate good form and strong side tackles, instead of using the weak side, which is when players foul.

“We have somebody doing the job to channel into the defender and the person standing behind them then comes up with the ball on a strongside block tackle,” she said. “And then we go back to packing the middle and force wide.”

Their efforts worked.

“It was just a really, good battle from the top-down, the whole way through,” she said. “I think we’re a force to be reckon with this season. I think we’re going to surprise some people.”

Mansfield scored its first goal after Ship scored its second. Garibaldi scored on a stroke and Kenedy Stroup, of Millerstown, had an unassisted goal for the Moutaineers.

With 43 seconds remaining in the first half, Mansfield’s Alex Esterling, of Wilmington, Delaware, scored after a flurry in front of the cage – shots, blocks, and rebounds. Her goal tied it 2-2.

Garibaldi scored once more in the third, as did Esterling, making it 3-3.

The real mettle surfaced in 7 aside. Both goalies withstood the trial but only one could leave victorious.  

“It really feels amazing to get the outcome that we wanted,” Ship goalie Lindsay Tripodo said.

Tripodo said she had “complete confidence” in her team. Her self-talk went something like, “this ball’s coming near me. It’s not going in.”

“Oh, heck no,” she said. “It’s not going in today, baby.”

The last time Shippensburg and Mansfield played an overtime game was in 1997. Ship won in double-overtime.

Shippensburg: 4

• Goals – Jedeloo (2), Garibaldi (2)
• Shots – 32
• Assists – Maura Mears (1), Garibaldi (1)
• Corners – 11
• Saves – 5

Mansfield: 3

• Goals – Esterling (2), Kenedy Stroup (1)
• Shots – 13
• Assists – Saramae Radel (1)
• Corners – 4
• Saves – 16