Dartmouth Stumbles in Opener, Falling to No. 20 Iowa

Friday, August 31

Iowa City, Iowa

4:00 PM

Dartmouth College

(0-1)

Iowa

(2-1)

Dartmouth

Iowa

Photo by: Iowa Hawkeyes

Dartmouth Stumbles in Opener, Falling to No. 20 Iowa

8/31/2018 5:38:00 PM | Field Hockey

Box Score

Big Green unable to hold off Hawkeyes' offensive surge.

By: Pat Salvas

IOWA CITY, IOWA – The Dartmouth field hockey team dropped its 2018 season opener, 6-0, Friday afternoon at No. 20 Iowa.

The Hawkeyes were led by a hat trick from Katie Birch and a pair of goals from Maddy Murphy. Senior goalkeeper Hailey Valerio did all she could to stop the high-powered offense of the home team, turning aside 11 shots in the game to post the eighth performance of double-digit saves of her career.

The game turned at the half when the home team built on their 2-0 lead from the opening 35 minutes. Birch and Murphy scored in the opening frame in their team's first showing in front of the home crowd before helping to pull away in the second.

Makenna Grewe made it a three-goal goal game less than five minutes into the second stanza. Birch scored twice more in the 44th and 55th minutes, respectively, sandwiched around Murphy's second of the day and third of the season in the 54th minute. The second Murphy goal and Birch's hat trick marker were separated by 83 seconds.

The Hawkeyes were dominant in their home opener, outshooting Dartmouth, 28-3, with a 17-1 edge in shots on goal. Corners were also 12-0 in favor of Iowa as the home team's pressure paid off throughout the contest.

"We can't win a game when we shoot three times," head coach Amy Fowler said. "We knew coming into the weekend that they (Iowa) are a good team. It seemed like last weekend they had trouble finishing plays, which wasn't the case today. They took advantage of their corners and we had some defensive breakdowns that we need to work on.

"We're happy we get to play tomorrow with an opportunity to turn our early-season momentum around quickly," Fowler added.

The Big Green will look to bounce back Saturday in the first-ever meeting against Ball State at 3:30 p.m. EST at Grant Field.

All three first-year field players saw action in the game as Sara Falkson started with Cecelia Monnin and Gracyn Campbell rotating in off the bench.

NOTES: This was the first-ever meeting between the two programs…Head coach Amy Fowler, now in her 19th season at Dartmouth, was a two-time First Team All-American (1991, '92) at Iowa and a 1993 graduate…Associate head coach Pattie Gillern, now in her seventh season on the Big Green sidelines, was also an All-American at Iowa, graduating in 2003.