This season, Syracuse has faced 348 different players split relatively evenly among 16 teams. All 348 play right-handed, but that will change Saturday.

“There is one girl on the Michigan team who plays left-handed,” senior Elaine Carey said, “which is unusual. As far as I know, she’s a really good player for them.”

That girl is Carly Bennett, a forward for the Wolverines. When 14th seed Syracuse (12-6, 2-4 Atlantic Coast) faces off with No. 3 seed Michigan (19-2, 8-0 Big Ten) at Ocker Field in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in the first round of the NCAA tournament, it will try to stop Bennett, who has nine goals and 24 points this season. UM has two players with more goals than Bennett, but neither poses a defensive difficulty like the lefty.

“I’ve never seen something like that before,” junior back Roos Weers said.

Bennett is a natural southpaw and played ice hockey left-handed growing up. When she started playing field hockey in high school, she stuck with her dominant hand. Since left-handed field hockey sticks don’t exist, Bennett turns the stick over in her hands, playing with the ‘J’ shaped tip on the turf. This allows the subtle front-side curve of the stick to face away from Bennett.

Playing southpaw opens up different shooting lanes for Bennett, and forces defenders to recognize where she is at the field at all times. Normally, a defender will force an opposing attacker to their weak side, their left hand, to create an advantage for themselves.

But with Bennett, if a Syracuse player forces her left to the defenders’ own strongside, Bennett will still be on her strongside as well.

“She’s pretty effective at what she does,” SU head coach Ange Bradley said of Bennett.

It creates a tricky situation of locating Bennett on the field and playing defense effectively. And as far as senior midfielder Laura Hurff can remember, Syracuse has never played against a lefty in her four years.

The challenge of facing a lefty is not insurmountable, though. By playing lefty, Hurff said, Bennett has made it harder to reverse hands and play righty. If the Orange locks off Bennett’s strong side, she will be forced into shooting backhanded with her stick upside down and backward.

“She’s already starting on reverse,” Hurff said, “so her hands are already set up so that she can’t even really swing a shot unless she learned how to flip her hands.”

Another key is help defense, Hurff said. SU heavily stresses back tackling, and that will be paramount against Bennett. If a defender fails to recognize and flip Bennett to her weak hand, defensive help from the midfield will be critical to quelling any chances, Hurff said.

“It’s just different,” Bradley said. “… You just have to make the adjustments like playing a left hander in tennis or badminton, whatever it is. The angles are just a little bit different.”

But Syracuse is a team likely capable of handling Bennett’s unorthodox style. Defense is undoubtedly SU’s strong suit: The Orange tied a program record with 11 shutouts in the regular season and only allowed 0.87 goals per game, third-best in the country. It will have to stay that way Saturday.

“We know we have a job to get done,” Hurff said.

Published on November 8, 2017 at 10:20 pm

Contact Andrew: aegraham@syr.edu | @A_E_Graham