HANOVER — Missed opportunities came back to haunt the Dartmouth women’s soccer team as it fell 2-0 to Brown in the Ivy League Women’s Soccer Tournament semifinals on a wet, cold night at Burnham Field on Thursday.
Two first-half goals from the No. 4-seeded Bears proved enough as the No. 1-seeded Big Green, the tournament’s defending champions and this year’s regular-season conference champions, could not muster a comeback in the final 45 minutes.
Dartmouth amassed 12 shots, four on net, along with five corners, in the loss that knocked it out of the tournament, which grants the champion an automatic berth into the NCAA Division I 64-team women’s soccer tournament.
“Disappointed, but credit to Brown, they came to play tonight,” said Big Green head coach Taylor Schram.
“They were fired up from the beginning. Thought we played well in the first half, created some chances, and then we just got a little bit rattled in the second half. We felt ourselves chasing the clock and just couldn’t find enough attack,” she added.
Dartmouth came out hot offensively, creating multiple chances within the first five minutes of the contest.
As the Big Green seized early momentum, they had a chance to stun the Bears when junior Emmanuella Frimpomaa stole a ball deep in the Bears’ end, moved inside the 18-yard box, and was taken down, drawing a penalty kick just over six minutes into the game.
But the Big Green couldn’t capitalize. Sophomore Lykke Ihrfelt sent the penalty low and to the right, and it was denied by Brown’s diving sophomore keeper, Addison Etter, a moment Schram described as “pretty monumental.”
“I think it happened early enough in the half that it shouldn’t have sort of deterred us completely. And I thought we were still able to generate some good attack in the first half and create quality chances, despite missing the pen,” she said.
Adding: “But I think that’s the tough part when you play Brown is they had a few half chances and were able to capitalize, and I thought we created chances and didn’t, and that was the name of the game.”
Etter’s save sent a surge of momentum to her squad, which started to create pressure. Eventually, Brown broke through with 16:39 remaining in the first half.
Bears’ freshman Georgia Steinbach sent a ball deep into the 18-yard box to senior Corine Gregory, who, with a smooth first touch, created an open shot that Dartmouth senior keeper Ola Goebel saved.
Unfortunately for the Big Green, their keeper’s initial save rebounded out to senior Joy Okonye, who was waiting at the left post and finished the ball off the volley into an open net to give Brown a 1-0 lead.
Dartmouth pushed almost immediately after going down a score, but, as the theme of the night showed, it couldn’t finish.
About a minute after Brown’s goal, a ball sent in off a free kick found junior Stephanie Lathrop wide open at the top of the 6-yard box, and she sent it over the net.
Shortly after, a ball sent in off a Dartmouth corner was punched out to senior Frankie Valverde, who fired it into a mass of bodies out in front of the net; it stayed loose and pinballed between a gaggle of Bears and Big Green athletes before eventually being cleared.
As Dartmouth’s offense struggled to find the back of the net, Brown took advantage. The Bears went up 2-0 with just under 11 1/2 minutes left in the first half after a picture-perfect pass from senior Claire Silverman, sent from before midfield, found freshman Anya Tansil running down the middle of the pitch.
The freshman shrugged off junior Lourdes Lauterborn and beat Goebel with her left foot to increase Brown’s lead.
The Bears’ lead lasted through the break and the rest of the contest as they packed it in and slowed Dartmouth’s attack in the second half.
“I thought they were just really conservative with their choices. Like they didn’t try to play out in the second half much. They were really just — as soon as we tried to go forward or get in behind or put a ball in behind, it was coming right back at us,” Schram said.
“So it was really disruptive, and we weren’t able to get as much attack from that because they just weren’t allowing us to take advantage or capitalize on any mistakes,” she added.
The Big Green finished the season 11-4-2 and won its first outright Ivy League regular-season title since 2003. While her squad fell short of its goal of making an NCAA tournament appearance for the second straight season, Schram said there’s a lot to be proud of.
“It’s hard to see through that, see through the disappointment right now,” she said. “But I know that when we wake up tomorrow and the next day and the next day, we’re going to be really proud of what we accomplished this year.”
She said the feeling will motivate the team through the off-season.
