ITHACA, N.Y. — The Cornell women's soccer team continues its stretch of having four out of five matches at Berman Field on Saturday afternoon when it welcomes Ivy League rival Harvard for a 2 p.m. first touch.

MATCH INFORMATION
Harvard at Cornell
SITE: Berman Field – Ithaca, N.Y. (natural surface)
RECORDS: Harvard (7-3-1, 2-1-0 Ivy League), Cornell (3-2-5, 0-2-1 Ivy League)
SERIES RECORD: Harvard leads, 28-3-9
BROADCAST: ESPN+
Stats: CornellBigRed.com

LAST TIME OUT
Senior forward Laken Gallman and Columbia's Shira Cohen traded goals as Cornell played to a 1-1 draw with Columbia at an unseasonably warm Berman Field on Wednesday.

Gallman netted the lone tally for Cornell in the 23rd minute, while Cohen's marker came in the 55th minute.

Both teams' offenses were on full display as each side recorded 16 shot attempts. Despite the even number of attempts, Columbia tripled Cornell in shots on goal, 9-3.

Junior goalkeeper Erica Fox continued her standout play between the pipes for the Big Red, logging a career-high eight saves, while Paige Nurkin stopped two Cornell shots.

HOME, SWEET, HOME
After losing its home opener last season, Cornell is unbeaten over its previous 11 home matches (5-0-6), which remains the longest home unbeaten streak in program history.

The record was established in the Big Red's victory over Colgate on Sept. 26, as Sydney Malaga scored in the 84th minute to break open a scoreless contest, lifting Cornell to the 1-0 win. With the victory, it bested the previous record of nine matches, initially set during a stretch of contests during the 1985 and 1986 seasons (8-0-1).

Entering this afternoon's match, Cornell is one of 17 women's soccer programs with an active unbeaten streak of at least 11 contests on its home pitch.

Brown (12) and the Big Red (11) are the only two Ivy League programs with unbeaten streaks of at least 10 matches on their respective home pitches. Princeton owns the next longest streak as the Tigers are unbeaten over its last seven contests at Myslik Field at Roberts Stadium.

With a win or tie against Harvard this afternoon, Cornell would extend its unbeaten streak to 12 matches. Brown is the lone program owning a 12-match home unbeaten streak entering Friday's contests.

Arkansas (28), Alabama (27), Stanford (21), South Alabama (20), UCLA (18), Memphis (17), Georgetown, Maine, and North Carolina (15), BYU, Santa Clara, and Vanderbilt (13) currently assume the top 10 positions for the longest active unbeaten streak.

THANKS FOR THE HELP!
Senior midfielder Reagan Pauwels recorded her team-leading fifth assist in Wednesday's draw with Columbia, becoming the 18th player (20th instance) in Cornell program history to register five-plus assists in a single season.

Pauwels is the sixth Cornell player this century to post five-plus assists in one season and is the first to do so since Caroline Growney also registered five helpers in 2015. 

With another assist, Pauwels would officially enter the Big Red's top 10 for the most assists in one season, matching Donna Eberhardt (1988), Amy Snow (1991, 1992), Rebecca D'Aleo (1993), Lori Penny (1993), and Dempsey Banks (2013) for the fifth-most assists in a season by one Cornell player.

Two more assists would give Pauwels a share of the single-season record, accomplished previously on four occasions by Laurie Collier (1986), Jennifer Smith (1987), Jennifer Daly (1994), and Amy Finkelstein (1994).

STUCK IN THE MIDDLE
After setting the single-season record for ties last season, Cornell matched that mark following its draw with Columbia on Wednesday afternoon.

Cornell has played to five draws this season, matching last season's mark during its 4-7-5 campaign. Four of Cornell's five ties have come over its previous seven contests, as the program has four-plus ties in one season for the fourth time in program history.

The Big Red's five draws are the most by any Ivy League program this season and are currently tied for the 15th-most among Division I programs entering Thursday's matches.

TEAM EFFORT
Thanks to Sydney Malaga's game-winning goal against Colgate last Tuesday, Cornell has five players with at least two goals scored this season. It is the most multi-goal scorers for the Big Red in a season since 2013, when it also had five players with two-plus goals.

Should another Cornell player register a second goal this season, it would be the first time the Big Red has had six multi-goal scorers since 1999 (6).

There have been eight prior instances of Cornell registering at least six players with multiple goals: 1986, 1988, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, and 1999.

ANCIENT EIGHT'S SUCCESS
Through matches completed on Thursday, the Ivy League has excelled on the pitch, registering a combined 48-19-20 record, leading to a cumulative .667 win percentage, pacing all 31 Division I conferences sponsoring women's soccer.

The Ivy League boasts a 27-point lead over the SEC (93-44-39 — .639) and a 32-point advantage over the Big Ten (93-45-40 — .635).

Entering this weekend's Ivy League slate, all eight members of the Ancient Eight have at least a .500 win percentage, while six programs boast win percentages north of .650.

Only the Ivy League and the SEC are the lone two Division I women's soccer conferences to have all its members' win percentages be at least .500. The Big Ten (12-of-14) and West Coast Conference (7-of-9) are all two programs shy.

SCOUTING HARVARD
Boasting one of the top offenses in the country, Harvard enters Saturday afternoon's match with an overall record of 7-3-1 and an Ivy League mark of 2-1-0.

The Crimson have averaged 2.55 goals scored per contest, ranking 25th nationally. Harvard features a well-rounded scoring attack, which includes five players with at least 11 points. Nine of the Crimson's 11 matches this season have featured Harvard scoring at least twice, as the lone matches without two-plus goals came against Pepperdine (1-1 draw on Sept. 3) and Brown (2-0 loss on Sept. 23).

Josefine Hasbo has a Harvard-leading 14 points (four goals, six assists), while Hannah Bebar and Gabby DelPicco (four goals, four assists) and Ólöf Kristinsdóttir (five goals, two assists) all have 12 points apiece. Kristinsdóttir, a freshman, leads all Crimson players with her five goals scored.

Anna Karpenko has started in 10 of Harvard's 11 matches this season, logging a 7-2-1 record with a 0.92 goals-against average and a .625 save percentage. The Crimson has a 1.18 goals-against average and a .567 save percentage, the third-worst in Division I women's soccer.

HARVARD'S LAST TIME OUT
Harvard defeated Dartmouth, 3-0, on Wednesday night at Jordan Field, delivering Dartmouth its first loss of the season.

Jasmine Leshnick opened the scoring for the Crimson with a highlight-reel bicycle kick with 13 seconds left in the first half. Leshnick's goal was featured as the No. 1 play on ESPN's SportsCenter top 10 plays.

Hannah Bebar and Audrey Francois tacked on second-half insurance markers for Harvard, who held Dartmouth to just one shot attempt and zero shots on goal over the 90-minute match. Bebar's second-half goal lifted the senior forward over the 50-point plateau.

Goalkeeper Anna Karpenko recorded her fifth clean sheet of the season for the Crimson.

40 YEARS, 328 MILES, 40 MEETINGS
Harvard has held the upper hand in the series, posting a 23-0-5 record over Cornell in the last 28 meetings, leading to its 28-3-9 record over the Big Red since the inaugural meeting in 1982. The Crimson offense has recently excelled against Cornell, posting 12 multi-goal efforts over the last 14 matches.

Cornell's last victory over the Crimson was in a 1-0 overtime win on Oct. 2, 1993, at Robison Alumni Fields. Amy Duesing logged the game-winning goal for Cornell, registering one of her team-leading four Ivy League goals on the season.

Last year, No. 25-ranked Harvard posted a 5-1 victory over Cornell at Jordan Field in Cambridge, Mass., netting all five goals in the opening 51 minutes. Audrey Francois posted a five-point day for the Crimson, scoring twice and assisting on another Harvard tally. Sophie Hirst, Hollyn Torres, and Hannah Bebar were the other goal-scorers for the Crimson. Sydney Malaga halted the Crimson's bid at a clean sheet by netting her first collegiate tally in the 89th minute.

UP NEXT
Cornell will travel to Yale for an Ivy League match next Saturday at Reese Stadium in New Haven, Conn. The Big Red's penultimate regular season contest is slated to begin at 5 p.m. Match action will be broadcast live on ESPN+.