With under three minutes remaining, Rutgers lined up for a penalty corner. Down by three, the Scarlet Knights had pulled its goalie in favor of a kicking back and packed 10 players around the arc, hoping to overwhelm goalkeeper Borg van der Velde and her quartet of defenders.

Despite a clean insertion and shot, the SU defense swarmed the ball and regained possession. A few passes and a breakaway from Chiara Gutsche put the Orange up 4-0 with 2:30 remaining.

“We wanted to score,” SU head coach Ange Bradley said. “We don’t care, we wanna win.”

A day after surrendering its first goal of the season, No. 3 Syracuse (8-1, 1-1 Atlantic Coast) and its defense recovered to shutout No. 24 Rutgers (5-3), 4-0, on Sunday afternoon at J.S. Coyne Stadium. The Orange backline wasn’t perfect, allowing six penalty corners and giving up four shots on goal, among the lowest marks on the year. But behind a strong showing from redshirt sophomore Jamie Martin in her first career start and Syracuse’s ability to translate stops into attacking chances, SU blanked the Scarlet Knights.

“I think it shows a lot of toughness on our team,” Bradley said. “Rutgers threw everything at us.”

The Syracuse backline provided sparks for the offense. A Ross Weers goal off a penalty corner put SU up 1-0. The defense, as it had the entire year, worked the ball up the spine of the field to its forwards and followed from behind.

Weers fired a pass from about 30 yards outside the arc to Sarah Luby who deflected the ball past Rutgers goalkeeper Gianna Glatz to give the Orange a 3-0 advantage just before half.

After spending all spring at right back, Bradley said, Martin was sidelined with a pair of knee injuries. But making her first career start, Martin played lockdown defense against the Scarlet Knights.

“It was really encouraging,” Bradley said, “She’s (Martin) starting to get her legs back under her.”

With the All-American Weers protecting the left side, Rutgers keyed in on the inexperience of Martin, SU’s weakest link on the back line. In the first half, Rutgers consistently tried to beat Martin one-on-one down the Orange’s right wing. But every attempt came up short. Martin jabbed, poked or swept away the ball, corralling the ball and pushing transition.

Although the back line shut out Rutgers, SU gave up six penalty corners, the second-highest mark all season. Some of those Rutgers opportunities came as a result of the Orange exchanging a Scarlet Knights breakaway with a penalty corner. On one play van der Velde toppled herself and a Rutgers forward to stop a mini-breakaway. Others came from unforced errors.

In the second half, Rutgers pushed the ball inside the SU arc. A shooting lane opened before Carolin Hoffmann skidded in and slide-tackled the ball out of play. Later, forward Elaine Carey had the ball at the top of SU’s arc and went to push the offense, but she kicked the ball. Both Hoffmann’s and Carey’s plays gave RU penalty corners.

“There were good moments,” Bradley said, “there were ugly moments.”

Rutgers had three penalty corners in five minutes, but SU’s backline didn’t fold. Facing clean shots on goal, van der Velde was relied on to make multiple stops. But even when 10 Scarlet Knights piled around the crease, the Orange defense made the stop and scored not five seconds later.

“Like I’ve said so many times,” Weers said, “the only team we can lose from is ourselves.”

Published on September 17, 2017 at 6:06 pm

Contact Andrew: aegraham@syr.edu | @A_E_Graham