ITHACA, N.Y. – With late heroics propelling the women's soccer team to victories over Marist and Albany last weekend, the Big Red will turn its attention to a showdown with regional rival Binghamton at 5 p.m. Wednesday at Berman Field.
 
GAME INFORMATION
GAME #6: Binghamton at Cornell
DATE: Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2013
TIME: 5 p.m.
SITE: Berman Field – Ithaca, N.Y. (grass surface)
2013 RECORDS: Binghamton 4-2-1, Cornell 3-1-1
VIDEO: None
AUDIO: www.ustream.tv/channel/brsn-live
LIVE STATS: www.sidearmstats.com/cornell/wsoc

ABOUT THE BIG RED
Cornell is off to its best start since 2005, thanks to three wins in its first five games – which equals the amount of the wins the team had in the last two seasons combined. Senior Rachel Nichols converted a penalty kick in the ninth minute of overtime to spur a 2-1 victory over Marist on Friday, then sophomore Brenna Mockler scored her first collegiate goal with 7.8 seconds remaining to give the Big Red a 5-4 win over Albany on Sunday. … Freshman Elizabeth Crowell had a monster seven-point weekend to take the team scoring lead with two goals and three assists and also earn her both Ivy League Player of the Week and Ivy League Rookie of the Week honors. Freshman Dempsey Banks has one goal and three assistst for five points, and sophomore Caroline Growney scored her first collegiate goal Sunday to go with one assist for three points. … Senior Tori Christ has been the primary goalkeeper with a 2-1-1 record, 1.41 goals-against average, .500 save percentage and one shutout. Freshman Kelsey Tierney (1-0, 0.48, .889) made her first collegiate start in Friday's win, and classmate Dana Daniels made her first appearance in goal Sunday.
 
ABOUT BINGHAMTON
The Bearcats had their four-game winning streak halted this weekend with a 2-0 loss at Temple and a 1-1 tie at home against Marist. The winning streak was the team's longest in nine years. Temple scored twice in the second half, then shut out the Bearcats for the first time this season. Binghamton then conceded a goal early in the second half against the Red Foxes before senior substitute Sophie Sylla scored the tying goal in the 75th minute. …
Sophomore Stephani Church leads the team in scoring with three goals and one assist for seven points, with two of those goals coming in a 3-1 victory over Niagara on Sept. 8. Sophomore Rebecca Raber is second on the team in scoring with one goal and a team-high three assists for five points. … Senior goalkeeper Carrie Martin has a 4-1 record with a 0.72 goals-against average and .857 save percentage. Junior Gaby Gold (0-1-1, 1.16, .833) has also made three appearances in goal.
 
THE SERIES WITH BINGHAMTON
The Big Red is 2-2-2 all-time against the Bearcats, with Binghamton answering a Maneesha Chitanvis '13 goal with a pair of second-half tallies for a 2-1 victory last season at Bearcats Sports Complex in Vestal, N.Y. Cornell was undefeated in the three previous matchups. A scoreless draw in 2009 was followed up by a 3-1 Big Red victory on Sept. 22, 2010. Chitanvis had a goal and an assist in that game, and Rachel Nichols scored her first collegiate goal later in the game. The 2011 affair featured just one goal, scored by Cornell substitute Xandra Hompe '13 in the 47th minute.
 
HEAD COACH PATRICK FARMER
Now in his 21st season as a head coach in the NCAA, Patrick Farmer is in his second season as the Cornell women's soccer program's fifth head coach. Farmer comes to the Big Red via the University of Wisconsin, where he served as an assistant coach with the Badgers' women's soccer team for three years. Prior to his stint at Wisconsin, Farmer has amassed a 261-97-40 record at Ithaca College, Penn State, Tennessee Tech and Syracuse. He also served as a head coach at the professional level for two seasons, heading the New York Power of the Women's United Soccer Association. Megan Ramey returns to Cornell for her third season as an assistant coach, and Dwight Hornibrook is in his second season as an assistant coach after serving as the head coach of SUNY Cortland men's soccer for eight years. Brett Sarsfield has also joined the staff as a volunteer assistant coach.
 
AND THE WINNER IS …
Freshman Elizabeth Crowell was named the Ivy League Rookie of the Week and the Ivy League Player of the Week on Monday after a dominating performance over the weekend with two goals and three assists against Marist and Albany. Crowell became the first Big Red player with three assists in a game since Amy Snow on Sept. 15, 1991. Crowell is the program's first Ivy League Player of the Week since Maneesha Chitanvis on Oct. 8, 2012, and the first Rookie of the Week since senior Mary Keroack on Sept. 6, 2010.
 
SPOT DUTY
Senior Rachel Nichols' overtime goal Friday against Marist was the Big Red's first converted peanlty kick since Sept. 5, 2010, when Caedran Harvey scored her first collegiate goal from the spot in a 7-0 win over Delaware State. Cornell had not been awarded a penalty kick since Sept. 14, 2011 in a game against Binghamton.
 
YOUTH IS SERVED
The Big Red had six of its seven goals and all five of its assists over the weekend produced by freshmen or sophomores. In all, 20 of Cornell's 24 points this season have been produced by underclassmen, with one goal coming from a junior (Kerry Schubert) and one goal coming from a senior (Rachel Nichols).
 
QUICK STARTERS
Cornell has had great success in the 31 season openers in the program's history, picking up a 17-10-4 mark in the first game of the season. That trend was reignited this season, when a 1-0 victory over Sacred Heart gave the Big Red its first win in a season debut since defeating Oakland (Mich.) in 2008.
 
BLANK YOU VERY MUCH
Senior goalkeeper Tori Christ recorded the first shutout of her collegiate career on Sept. 6 at Sacred Heart. She needed to make just two saves to record the shutout in her 16th collegiate start. Tending goal runs in the family for Christ, whose father, Philip, played goalie for the Northeastern hockey team in his collegiate days and currently serves as a practice goalie for the NHL's Buffalo Sabres. Christ and freshman goalkeeper Kelsey Tierney then split time in a scoreless draw with Buffalo on Tuesday, marking the first time since 2005 that the Big Red had two clean sheets in their first three games.
 
ALOHA!
Freshman Dempsey Banks needed less than five minutes to record the first point of her collegiate career, notching the primary assist on Kerry Schubert's goal Sept. 6 at Sacred Heart. Banks joins the Big Red from Honolulu, Hawaii, coming from the same strong Punahou School and Leahi SC programs that produced Jayann Gabrio '13, a key central defender for the Big Red over her collegiate career.
 
GOOD THINGS COME IN THREES
The Big Red has tri-captains for the fifth time in seven years with seniors Tori Christ and Rachel Nichols, and junior Claire MacManus wearing the armbands. Christ is the Big Red's first goalkeeper to serve as a two-time captain since Sherrie Chocola in 1985 and 1986.
 
SHE'S HONORED
Junior midfielder Claire MacManus was recognized for being one of the top defensive midfielders in the Ivy League last season, when she was tabbed as an All-Ivy Second Team selection. One of the team's best aerial threats, MacManus scored her only goal of last season against Sacred Heart. Off a corner kick on Sept. 14, MacManus redirected the service 10 yards from goal and past the Pioneers' keeper for the second of her collegiate career. MacManus is also a midfielder on the women's lacrosse team.
 
BREAKDOWN
The Big Red is carrying a roster of 25 players this season, which is the smallest since it carried 25 in 2009. While there are six seniors on this year's team, the most-represented class is the freshmen. Patrick Farmer's first recruiting class included eight freshmen, plus the addition of one transfer and two walk-ons.

NATIONAL APPEAL
The Big Red has 12 different states and China represented on the team roster, with its home state of New York claiming seven players. Cornell has three players that hail from New Jersey and Pennsylvania, two each from California and Virginia, and single representatives from Hawaii, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Mexico and Oregon. Dana Daniels comes from China, but joins the Big Red via The Bullis School in the Washington, D.C. metro area.

UP NEXT
Cornell takes to the road for a neutral-site game against Cincinnati at 7 p.m. Friday at the University of Bridgeport. The Big Red then returns home for a 4 p.m. tilt on Sunday against NJIT and its Ivy League opener on Friday, Sept. 27 against Columbia.