When the Syracuse field hockey bus pulls up to a visiting field, the music comes on. And the nerves dissolve.

‘Just before the games when we come off the bus, just to pump us up, we get the music going — our bus driver is usually really fun — and it just gets everyone pumped up,’ senior forward Lindsey Conrad said. ‘It’s usually the whole team, everyone kind of gets into it. It’s a mix of different people on different days.’

The team will get plenty of dance practice this year. SU is currently in a portion of its schedule in which it will play all 11 of its road games in a 12-game stretch. The 11 road games this season are the most regular-season games away from J.S. Coyne Field that Syracuse has had to play since playing the same number in 2006. That year, the Orange finished 10-9 and failed to play in either the NCAA tournament or the Big East tournament.

But for Syracuse head coach Ange Bradley, taking her team on the road isn’t always a bad thing.

‘I actually like being on the road better,’ Bradley said. ‘There are less distractions. They’re with their teammates the whole time, and there’s a little bit more control of their environment.

‘I don’t mean that in a strangulating way. It’s just their schedule is more controlled, there are less distractions and it’s kind of like we are all here for a purpose.’

This past weekend, the Orange had its first road games of the year as it traveled to Columbus, Ohio, to take on No. 14 Ohio State and unranked Kent State. The Orange defeated Ohio State 2-1 in overtime on Friday, but fell to Kent State in overtime on Saturday.

The loss to the Golden Flashes was SU’s first of the season, but Bradley said being on the road is no excuse for the Orange’s first loss to an unranked opponent since losing to Cornell on Oct. 25, 2007.

‘You got to play to win,’ Bradley said. ‘I don’t think the national championship game is at Syracuse or the Big East (tournament). If you’re going to win — which is what our ultimate goals is — you got to do that on the road. Home or away, it doesn’t matter — it’s a game of hockey, and you just have to play it.’

The Orange will still spend the next two weekends on the road before it plays its next home game against Louisville on Sept. 25. Sophomore back Iona Holloway said though she prefers to play games at Syracuse’s home field, the key to playing on the road is staying focused.

‘If you’re turning up at a new field, you may feel a bit disorientated,’ Holloway said. ‘But at the end of the day, all hockey fields are the same and we go out and we try to win.

‘You have to make sure there isn’t a difference. You have to try and keep the varying factors to a minimum. You can’t look at it as a different game just ‘cause it’s not at home.’

Although traveling to away games can be a hassle for most teams, the Orange likes to use the time away from SU for team bonding.

It can come in the form of a team sing-along with junior midfielder Martina Loncarica on the guitar and sophomore back Erika Wachter at the mic. Or it can come in the form of that pregame dance party that precedes every road contest.

‘It’s something that they just do,’ Bradley said. ‘You spend a lot of time together and you start thinking of stuff to do. We have a pretty funny group, a very funny group, and they just start doing fun things.’

And to Conrad, the road games are preparation. Preparation for a possible dance party to the year’s chief event: the final four in College Park, Md.

‘It’s always good to play somewhere else, play against someone else, and just get used to different fields,’ Conrad said. ‘At the end of the season, when we want to be playing, we’re probably not going to be home, so just getting used to being on the road is a good thing.’

rwmarfur@syr.edu

Published on September 7, 2010 at 12:00 pm