ITHACA, N.Y. — The women's soccer team plays its first of four home games in Ivy League play at 4 p.m. Saturday, when the Big Red hosts Penn at Berman Field. The game will be broadcast on ESPN Plus.
GAME INFORMATION
Penn at Cornell
DATE: Saturday, Sept. 29, 2018
TIME: 4 p.m.
SITE: Charles F. Berman Field – Ithaca, N.Y. (natural surface)
RECORDS: Cornell 1-6-1 (0-1 Ivy League); Penn 6-1-1 (0-0-1)
VIDEO: ESPN+
LIVE STATS: CornellBigRed.com
LAST TIME OUT
• Cornell is coming off a heartbreaking 2-1 golden-goal loss to Columbia in its Ivy League opener last Saturday in New York, falling to 1-6-1 at the halfway point of the season.
•
Kaili Gregory scored off corner-kick service from
Jessica Ritchie in the 24th minute, and the Big Red led until the 87th minute despite being outshot in the game by a 38-1 margin.
• Rachel Alexander finally equalized with 3:45 remaining in the second half for Columbia, the 2017 Ivy League runner-up, then she set up the winning goal 28 seconds into the second overtime period.
• Goalkeeper
Meghan Kennedy made a career-high 15 saves, including 10 in the second half. The 15 stops were tied for fifth-most in a single game for a Cornell goalkeeper in program history, and the most since 2001.
ABOUT THE BIG RED
•
Kaili Gregory has taken over the team scoring lead with five points on two goals and an assist. Her first goal of the year came in the 100th minute of Cornell's season-opening 2-1 overtime victory on Aug. 24 at St. Bonaventure.
•
Kennedy Yearby ranks second in team scoring with three points on a goal and an assist – both in the second half of a 2-2 tie with Albany on Sept. 18 during the Big Red's last game at Berman Field.
• With seven games left to play, Cornell has already eclipsed its goal output from the entire 2017 campaign.
•
Shelby Wray,
Naomi Jaffe and
Aidan Julia Reineman have the Big Red's other goals this season. Reineman also leads the team with 14 shots through seven games.
•
Meghan Kennedy is Cornell's primary goalkeeper, sporting a 1-4-1 record, 1.71 goals against average and .814 save percentage.
Chrissy Mayer (0-2, 1.00, .778) has also made a pair of starts, the last coming in a Sept. 16 1-0 loss at Saint Joseph's.
HEAD COACH DWIGHT HORNIBROOK
• After serving as an assistant coach for five seasons,
Dwight Hornibrook was named the program's sixth head coach in advance of the 2017 season.
• Hornibrook had 17 years of head coaching experience with the men's soccer programs at Houghton and SUNY Cortland before joining the Cornell women's soccer team. He has helped the Big Red win 33 games over the last six-plus years and now has an overall record as a head coach of 185-130-34.
• Two-time Cornell captain goalkeeper
Tori Christ '14 returns for her second season as an assistant coach, and
Eva Francavilla has joined the staff as an assistant coach.
BY THE NUMBERS
•
Jessica Ritchie (three goals, five assists) is Cornell's active scoring leader with 11 points, followed closely by
Kennedy Yearby's 10 (four goals, two assists) and
Kaili Gregory's seven (three goals, one assist).
• After leading the Ivy League with 82 saves last year,
Meghan Kennedy enters the game against Penn with a 1.39 career goals against average that ranks seventh on the program's all-time list and a .827 career save percentage that ranks ninth.
• As of Monday, Kennedy ranked seventh in the country with an average of 8.0 saves per game.
• Despite being whistled for six of the game's seven fouls at Columbia, Cornell has the seventh-least fouls per game in country with an average of 5.5.
THE REGGAE GIRL
• Freshman
Jadyn Matthews recently returned from a tour of duty with the Jamaica women's national soccer team, which is nicknamed the 'Reggae Girlz'.
• Matthews appeared twice as a reserve in CONCACAF Women's Caribbean Zone final round games against Antigua and Barbuda on Aug. 25 and Cuba on Sept. 2. The final round starts Oct. 5.
• Matthews has become the second Cornell women's soccer to play for her senior national team, joining
Rachel Nichols '14 after her tenure with The Philippines.
A CALL TO ARMBANDS
• Seniors
Meghan Kennedy and
Jessica Ritchie are serving as the Big Red's co-captains this season. Both players are among the team's leading contributors this season, with both wearing the armband for the first time in their collegiate careers. Cornell carries just three seniors and has 14 underclasswomen on its roster of 23.
NATIONAL APPEAL
• The Big Red has 12 different states and the District of Columbia represented on the team roster of 23.
• The most represented state on the Big Red is California, which is called home by six players. Four hail from New Jersey, three from Florida, and one each from Connecticut, Illinois, Maryland, Nevada, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Wisconsin and the District of Columbia.
• Though there are no Canadians among the players, head coach
Dwight Hornibrook is native to the New Brunswick capital of Fredericton.
ABOUT PENN
• At 6-1-1 after a scoreless draw against visiting Harvard on Saturday, the Quakers have matched a 1998 program record for best start to a season.
• The deadlock snapped a four-game winning streak for Penn, though it's stretched the squad's active shutout streak to 290 minutes, 17 seconds.
• Goalkeeper Kitty Qu now owns a program-record 15 clean sheets in her career, including six this season. She's played all but one half this season and ranks 11th in the nation with a 0.38 goals against average and 14th with a .897 save percentage.
• Kelsey Andrews lead the team in scoring with nine points on four goals and an assist. Sasha Stephens and Emily Sands both have three goals and an assist for seven points, and Paige Howard has scored twice. Allie Trzaska has a team-high five assists.
• Nicole Van Dyke is in her fourth season as the head coach at Penn.
THE SERIES WITH PENN
• The Quakers hold a 17-7-3 advantage in the all-time series after the teams remained deadlocked after 110 minutes on Sept. 29, 2017 at Penn's Rhodes Field.
Meghan Kennedy made what was then a career-high 10 saves to post the Big Red's second straight clean sheet.
• While the teams have combined for precisely zero goals in their last two clashes in Philadelphia, there have been no shortage of goals in the last two meetings in Ithaca. Penn soared to a 5-0 victory in its last visit Sept. 30, 2016, and Cornell held on for a 3-2 victory on Oct. 3, 2014.
• Penn enters the game with a shutout streak of 368 minutes, 13 seconds against Cornell.
UP NEXT
• Cornell hits the road for its next two games, starting with a visit to Harvard for an Ivy League contest at 1 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 6.
• The Big Red then takes the short jaunt to Colgate for its non-league finale at 4 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 9.
