ITHACA, N.Y. — The women's soccer team will look to climb into the middle of the Ivy League pack at 1 p.m. Saturday when it hosts Yale at Berman Field.
 
GAME INFORMATION
Yale at Cornell
DATE: Saturday, Oct. 15, 2016
TIME: 1 p.m.
SITE: Berman Field – Ithaca, N.Y. (natural surface)
RECORDS: Cornell 3-7-2, 0-2-1 Ivy League; Yale 5-4-3, 1-1-1 Ivy League
VIDEO: Ivy League Digital Network
LIVE STATS: CornellBigRed.com
 
ABOUT THE BIG RED
Cornell is 3-7-2 after a 1-0 loss to Colgate on Monday night, which wrapped up its non-league season. The Raiders scored the winning goal in the 84th minute on Sarah Coy's run between central defenders on a perfectly weighted pass from around midfield. Cornell had a chance to equalize with about three minutes remaining, but a shot sailed over the crossbar and left the Big Red scoreless in its last five games. … Cornell earned its first Ivy League point of the season on Satruday with a scoreless draw at Harvard, buoyed by sophomore Meghan Kennedy's six-save shutout in her first Ivy League appearance. … A dearth of offense has plagued the Big Red through the season's first six weeks, with the team scoring just four goals to date. Freshman Kennedy Yearby's strike in the team's 1-0 victory over Binghamton on Sept. 18 is the team's lone goal over its last nine games. … In September, Cornell endured the most challenging stretch of non-league games in five years under head coach Patrick Farmer. The Big Red forced overtime against ACC foe Syracuse on Sept. 4 on a goal from junior forward Tess Pullano, but the Orange scored a golden goal in overtime to end the Big Red's 13-game unbeaten streak in non-league games. Cornell then lost to nationally-ranked Rutgers, 2-0, before suffering a pair of 1-0 losses to Seton Hall and San Diego St. … The Big Red started the year with 1-0 victories on the road against Siena (Aug. 28) and Loyola (Sept. 2). Both games featured goals in the fifth minute from junior forward Paige DeLoach. … DeLoach leads the team in scoring with four points on her two goals, then Pullano has three points on her goal against Syracuse and an assist on DeLoach's goal at Loyola.
 
BIG RED REWIND
Cornell is coming off a memorable season in which it accomplished a host of heights the program has not recently seen. The Big Red was the last Division I women's team in the country to concede a goal in 2015, recording 10 consecutive shutouts and a program-record shutout streak of 1,059 minutes, 19 seconds dating back to November 2014. Cornell's undefeated mark through 11 games was also a first in program history, and the team's final record of 9-4-4 marked its best finish since 1995.. ... Senior midfielder Elizabeth Crowell led the team in scoring for a second straight year with nine points. The All-Ivy League first team selection had four goals and one assist, with her goal total tying for the team lead with DeLoach.
 
HEAD COACH PATRICK FARMER
Now in his 24th season as a head coach in the NCAA, Patrick Farmer is in his fifth season as the Cornell women's soccer program's head coach. Farmer came 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 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. Dwight Hornibrook is in his fifth season as an assistant coach after serving as the head coach of SUNY Cortland men's soccer for eight years, and the Big Red has added two new coaches for this year. Longtime Le Moyne head coach Tracey Leipold has joined the Big Red staff as an assistant coach, and Megan Giles is the volunteer assistant coach after winning two All-Southland Conference honors during her four-year career at Oral Roberts.
 
TIERNEY'S TALE
Senior Kelsey Tierney played every minute of the historic season in goal for the Big Red last year, helping the team tie a program single-season record with 12 shutouts and earning All-Ivy League first team honors. Tierney led the nation in goals against average for much of the season and finished the year ranked seventh (0.50), and she also ranked 13th in save percentage (.868). Her 12 shutouts ranked fourth in the nation, and she started this season on a similar note with a four-save blanking of Siena on Aug. 28. Tierney now has a career total of 20 shutouts, which is tied for second in program history with Sue DeLong and trails only Melissa Gambrell (22). Tierney also ranks tied for fourth in career victories (21) and sixth in career goals against average (1.17). Tierney and classmate Elizabeth Crowell gave the Big Red its first All-Ivy first-teamers since 1995.
 
A CALL TO ARMBANDS
Seniors Kelsey Tierney, Kailey Joyce and Elizabeth Crowell are serving as the Big Red's tri-captains this season. The group has three All-Ivy League selection between them, providing the Big Red with leadership that has logged significant minutes over their collegiate careers.
 
BALANCING ACT
For the first time in Patrick Farmer's tenure as the head coach, the Big Red has a balanced roster in terms of age and production. Cornell is carrying a roster of 30 players, including seven seniors. There are also nine juniors, six sophomores and eight freshmen on the roster. Of Cornell's 108 points over the last two seasons, 63 were produced by players who are still on the team.

NATIONAL APPEAL
The Big Red has 12 different states and the District of Columbia represented on the team roster, with its home state of New York claiming nine players. Cornell has three players each that hail from California and Maryland, two each from the District of Columbia, New Jersey, Ohio and Pennsylvania, and one each from Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Nevada, Oregon and Texas. The nine players from New York marks the most on a Cornell roster since it had 15 Empire State natives on the 1997 squad.
 
ABOUT YALE
The Bulldogs improved to 5-4-3 overall and evened their Ivy League record at 1-1-1 with a 1-0 victory over Dartmouth last Saturday. The Big Green seven shots on target against just three from Yale, but freshman midfielder Noelle Higginson's goal in the 73rd minute proved to be the difference. Freshman goalkeeper Alyssa Fagel made seven saves for her first collegiate shutout. … Yale's other Ivy League games to date were a 2-1 loss to Harvard on Oct. 1 and 1-1 tie with defending champion Princeton on Sept. 24. … Freshman forward Ariel Chavarin leads the offense with 19 points on eight goals and three assists. Sophomore forward Michelle Alozie ranks second in scoring with 10 points, and second in goals with three alongside junior midfielder Sarah McCauley and sophomore midfielder Sofia Griff. … Three goalkeepers have earned at least three starts for the Bulldogs, but Fagel is the primary option with a 2-3-2 record, 1.24 goals against average and .769 save percentage.
 
THE SERIES WITH YALE
The all-time series is extremely close despite a dearth of draws, with Cornell cutting Yale's advantage to 18-16 after a 1-0 victory on Oct. 17, 2015 in New Haven. Elizabeth Crowell scored on a rebound after her penalty kick was saved in the 27th minute, and Kelsey Tierney made three saves for the shutout. Yale won by identical 1-0 scores in 2012, 2013 and 2014.
 
UP NEXT
The Big Red will play its final road game of the regular season at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 22 at Brown. Cornell then returns to Berman Field to close out the home portion of its schedule against defending Ivy League championship Princeton at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 29 and Senior Day at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 5 against Dartmouth.