Tayllar Righini loses the ball to a Saint.
Emerson women’s soccer was ripped open by Emmanuel College on Saturday afternoon due to clumsy Lion mistakes and inconsistent defending.
Emmanuel College’s Lindsey Garvey took advantage of an erratic Emerson defense early on, scoring a goal just over three minutes into the game. The junior forward would add two more goals in the first 30 minutes to complete a natural hat trick.
The Lions did not have an answer either offensively or defensively as they were downed by Emmanuel 6-0. It was the first road loss of the season for Emerson, now 6-3-3 and 4-2-3 in the Great Northeast Athletic Conference.
After being down 1-0 from the start, it wasn’t long before an Emerson error allowed Garvey to claim another goal on the first corner kick of the game. Sophomore goalie Allie Altman stopped Garvey’s shot from going in the net; however, it was ruled that she was standing inside the goal when she caught the ball. The final goal of Garvey’s hat trick came twelve minutes later as she took advantage of another inept gaffe by Emerson.
The Lions’ offense did not see success as sloppy passing and a couple of missed opportunities summed up the first half for Emerson, including a breakaway shot that was missed wide by freshman forward Christine White.
Head coach David Suvak said that Emmanuel’s quick start in the first half caught his team off-guard.
“I don’t know if they were ready to begin the game that fast,” Suvak said. “The Emmanuel team came out very strong on us and I don’t think we were ready for it.”
At the start of the second half, up 3-0, Emmanuel continued to create chances, but strong play both around and in front of the net by senior defender Kara Patano kept the Saints from extending the lead. Emmanuel players fired two fierce shots at the Emerson goal on consecutive possessions, but Patano made a pair of blocks that kept the Lions in the game.
When asked about her blocks, Patano laughed and said there weren’t any thoughts going through her head and that she just wanted to kick the ball away from her end of the field.
Emerson wasted yet another scoring opportunity when White broke away, but an Emmanuel defender caught up to her and stole the ball.
More Emerson errors allowed the Saints to pad the score by adding three additional goals, including one on a penalty kick.
After the shutout, Suvak took much of the blame for his team’s maladroit performance.
“I do think I’ve got to prepare the team a little bit better than what I’ve done, so I take a lot of the blame for what happened to us out there today,” he said. “I think my preparation kind of fell short in some areas, so I’ve got to work on that and kind of think about how to adjust the team for Monday’s match.”
Suvak also added that speed of play, aggressiveness, and being dangerous in and around the box are a few things his team can improve on.
Patano said the team’s lackluster performance could be chalked up to the team having a bad day.
“Every once in a while,” she said, “you have one of those games where, no matter what you do, you just can’t get it together.”
The Lions will next face Norwich University on Oct. 13 at Rotch Field.