The field hockey team made predictably short work of Bates in its NESCAC Championship quarterfinal matchup last Saturday, taking down the Bobcats 4-1 at home to advance to the semifinal round. The top-seeded Polar Bears will host fourth-seeded Amherst tomorrow at 11:00 am, and, with a win, will host the winner of Middlebury v. Tufts in the conference championship match on Sunday.
Within the first three minutes of the victory over Bates, Rachel Kennedy '16 became the program’s all-time leading scorer with her 93rd career goal. Later in the half she picked up her 94th. Kennedy eclipsed the 92-goal mark set by Lindsay McNamara ’09.
The accomplishment, while astounding, is nothing less than what the team expected of Kennedy, who they say has done nothing but dedicate herself to both her team and the game for the past four years.
“She is one of the most fiercely determined players on the field,” Liz Znamierowski '16 said of Kennedy. “She puts her heart and soul into every practice and every game—I don’t think a single person on this team had any doubt she’d break that record.”
Znamierowski, who has been a key contributor herself, fed Kennedy the pass that led to her history-making, goal. Kennedy was quick to attribute the record to the entire team’s efforts.
“Truthfully, they deserve the credit for it because they are the ones that were able to feed me the ball or set me up for easy shots,” Kennedy said. “Being a forward, it’s my responsibility to score goals, so it’s definitely a bit easier to be recognized over other positions on the field.”
With at least one NESCAC tournament game and an assured NCAA tournament berth still ahead of her, Kennedy boasts 94 career goals and 206 career points. Of course, the numbers mean nothing if unaccompanied by a W on the stat sheet.
“Winning as a team is what matters most for me, and everything else is just bonus,” Kennedy said.
She’s in the right place. Now 16-0 on the season and ranked No. 1 in all of D-III, the Polar Bears were heavily favored in their game against the Bobcats, who were in their first NESCAC playoff since 2010. After Kennedy’s first goal in the first few minutes, Bates quickly tied it up to 1-1. However, the Bears fired back soon after, starting with a goal from Kimmy Ganong ’17. 24 seconds later, Kennedy’s second goal of the day opened the lead to two. The lone goal of the second half was courtesy of Nicole Barbieri ’19.
Undefeated as it is in perhaps the nation’s toughest conference, the team has no plans to make any significant tactical adjustments going forward.
“We will continue to work on implementing the fundamentals in all of our games,” said Znamierowski. “Looking forward to Amherst, we’ll definitely be looking to play clean, stick-to-stick hockey, and make use of our core, fundamental skills.”
The team appears to be focused entirely on Amherst, despite the possibility of a championship matchup against archrival Middlebury. Bowdoin has faced off against Middlebury the last three years in the NESCAC finals, falling short of a win each time.
“I know this is a really important weekend for everyone on the team, especially the seniors because we’ve never won a NESCAC championship,” Kennedy said. “The most important thing is that we play to the standard that we know we can.”
When speaking of the possibility of a match-up against Middlebury again, the Bears always react in a similar way—they do not want to look too far ahead.
“We’ve had an incredible season so far and we just want to prolong the season as long as possible,” Kennedy said.
If the team’s tournament run is prolonged past the semifinal stage, they’ll play for the conference title at noon on Sunday at Howard F. Ryan Field.