Field hockey advances to Big Ten championship

Spartans throttle defending tournament champs Iowa 5-1

The No. 8 MSU field hockey team proved once again Friday it can equal any challenge presented to it in the Big Ten.

The Spartans showcased their maturity and ability to possess the ball in wiping out fourth-seeded Iowa and its 10-game conference tournament win streak to earn a trip to Sunday’s Big Ten tournament championship game.

MSU had fallen to Iowa each of the past two seasons in the conference semifinals, but the Spartans made it clear from early in the game they were not stuck in the past.

The Spartans scored four first half goals in their 5-1 victory and created chance after chance, thanks to stellar passing and strong defensive play.

“Our gameplan was to possess and pass around, and we’ve been working on it very well and I think we knew just how to go around them rather than go through them,” senior midfielder Floor Rijpma said.

MSU was a blur moving up the field in the first half, pouncing on opportunities whenever they came.

Freshman forward Manouk Vernij connected on a penalty corner to put MSU ahead 1-0 less than five minutes into the game. Then Iowa had a nice chance on a corner about two minutes later, but senior goalie Elissa Unger made a diving save to keep it 1-0.

Near the halfway mark of the first half, junior forward Jantine Steinmetz delivered a beautiful feed in front of the net that was deflected in by Rijpma.

“She shot it and knew where I was, and I was just able to deflect it in,” said Rijpma, recently named the conference’s Offensive Player of the Year. “I think that that’s a matter of how we can find each other and how she knows where I am.”

The Spartans struck again when senior midfielder Jeamie Deacon’s blast off a penalty corner ricocheted off a player, hit the top of the net and bounced in to make it a 3-0 lead.

MSU continued to pressure, and Vernij demonstrated fine stickwork as she set up fellow freshman Adelle Lever for a goal to make it 4-0 going into halftime.

The Hawkeyes came out slightly stronger to begin the second half, converting on a penalty corner to cut the deficit to 4-1, but MSU stepped up its defensive effort to prevent a Hawkeye comeback.

Vernij netted her second goal of the game with 7:15 left to make the score 5-1, and it would stay that way for the rest of the match.

“In the first half, for sure, we put it to goal as a team, and we were very selfish in finding the net,” head coach Rolf van de Kerkhof said. “I compliment my team for that.”

Vernij made several big plays and has made her presence felt in her first year with the team, ranking second on the team in points.

The Spartans will play Indiana — a 3-1 winner against Penn State in the other semifinal — in the championship game, slated for noon on Sunday at Ralph Young Field.

The game will be televised live on Big Ten Network.

Having already wrapped up a Big Ten regular season championship, the 16-3 Spartans will have a chance Sunday to do something they haven’t done since 2003 — win the tournament championship.

“We played extremely strong in the first half and it was just fun being on the field,” sophomore back Holly Sherman said. “When you get close, you want to keep going and keep the momentum up.”