The No. 8 American University field hockey team will take on the Lafayette Leopards this Saturday, October 30 at 11:00 a.m. In a match up of unbeaten conference foes, the winner will be crowned Patriot League Regular Season Champion and earns the right to host the 2010 Patriot League Tournament November 5-6.
The Eagles (14-3, 4-0) are coming off an impressive 6-0 win against Bucknell last Saturday at Jacobs Field. Five different student-athletes notched a goal en route to the victory, including a two-goal performance from Shelly Montgomery which earned her Patriot League Player of the Week honors on Monday.
Senior forward Christine Fingerhuth leads American with a career-high 14 goals and has been named Patriot League Offensive Player of the Week in four of the last five weeks. She ranks seventh in program history with 108 career points, and her 48 career goals is good for fifth all-time. Five other Eagles have recorded at least five goals this season, including Lotte van de Mierop (8), Montgomery (8), Gina Hofmann (7), Anne van Erp (6) and Melissa Casale (5). Kirstin Gebhart, Hofmann and Natalie Ellenberger lead the team with 12, 10 and 10 assists, respectively.
Senior Hannah Weitzman has been outstanding in the cage this season, posting a 14-3 overall record. She is currently ranked fifth in the nation with a 0.90 goals against average, sports a .737 save percentage and has notched five shutouts.
Lafayette (8-8, 4-0) has won three of its last four games, including a 6-3 victory over Georgetown last weekend. The Leopards are led by the duo of Meghan Cicchi and Deanna DiCroce, who have combined for 61 of Lafayette's 128 total points this season. Cicchi, a senior defender/midfielder, leads the team with 13 goals on 68 shots. DiCroce has scored nine goals of her own and also leads the squad with 14 assists. In the cage, Kelsey Andersen has a 2.21 gaa and .671 save percentage for the Leopards.
The Eagles upended Lafayette 2-0 in last season's Patriot League Championship despite losing 2-1 in their regular season meeting. That loss ended a 46th match win streak for American against conference opponents, a streak which dated back to the 2003 season. American has gone 9-4 against the Leopards since joining the Patriot League in 2001.
Before Saturday's match, American will celebrate the careers of its seven seniors playing in their final regular season home game at Jacobs Field. The class of 2011has won both the regular season and conference tournament title in every year since arriving at American, and their 55 career wins makes them the seventh winningest class in American field hockey history.
Fans unable to attend the match can catch all of the action live through AUeagles.com via a subscription to Eagles Vision TV. Year-long subscriptions are $49.95 and allow you to watch every live broadcast produced by Eagles Vision TV and access to the Eagles Vision TV archives to watch past games on-demand. Single-game subscriptions, which are only available during live broadcasts, are also available for $5.95 per event.
