Fairfield wanted to continue its winning streak against the Manhattan Jaspers, who haven’t beaten the Stags since 2003. The Stags are fresh off a 4-1 win against Canisius and looked to carry their momentum as they hosted the Manhattan Jaspers at Rafferty Stadium on Wednesday, Sept. 30, but tied 1-1 making their current conference record 1-1-1 and overall record 4-6-2.
The Stags were down 1-0 in the first half after a goal by the Jaspers when midfielder Erica Modena took control of a pass made by Nicole Copping and scored the first goal of the game with 10 minutes remaining in the half.
A challenge for the Stags was winning balls in the air at midfield. But with the Stags’ strong attacks, they were able to charge forward with the ball and set up several shots on goal.
Just 12 minutes into the second half, defender Elena Santos ‘19 connected a pass to forward Jenny Jacobs ‘19, who scored her first career goal for the Stags. According to Jacobs, “Being a goal down forced us to step up and really start fighting for every ball. It fueled us and I was glad I contributed. It felt really good to even the score, but we still felt we had more to do.”
For the rest of the game, the Stags seemed to have the upper hand and ultimately outshot Manhattan 19-10. Since the Stags’ offense was well-organized, they were able to break the Jaspers’ defense and frame some space for goal opportunities. When it went into overtime, they took advantage of every minute left.
“Our strategy was to dribble at the defenders and to make sure that the back line stayed compact together as a unit so that we didn’t get split or beat. We wanted the win so bad that everyone no matter how sore or fatigued we were worked very hard to try and score to win the game,” Santos said.
Going into two overtime periods, Jacobs had another chance to score on goal. But to no avail, the Jaspers’ defense continued to cause difficulties for the Stags to attain the winning goal. Fairfield was unable to convert as Manhattan’s goalkeeper Kristen Skonieczny finished the game with five saves.
However, Manhattan is just one of their tough matches. Fairfield’s next seven games will consists of matchups against Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference rivals like Rider, Marist and Iona. The Stags are looking forward to their match against Rider, the team they lost to during the finals of the MAAC Championship and who they will encounter on Oct. 10.
“Everyone in the MAAC is really good this year, so each team is hard to beat. Our goal is to be a huge player in the tournament at the end of the season and hopefully win out the MAAC,” Jacobs said.
The Stags’ next game will be played against Iona on Wednesday Oct. 7 at 7 p.m. at Lessing Field.
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