Field Hockey Falls to No. 15, Iowa, 5-3

Oct. 21, 2016

EAST LANSING, Mich. - The Michigan State field hockey team lost to No. 15 Iowa on Friday afternoon, 5-3. MSU is now 7-9 on the year and 3-4 in the Big Ten, while the Hawkeyes improve to 11-6 overall and 3-4 in the conference. Senior captain Kristin Matula scored her ninth goal of the season to make it four straight games with a goal and freshman Kelsey Keener registered her first career two-goal game.

Iowa jumped out to a big lead on the effort of the Big Ten's leading scorer, Natalie Cafone, who recorded a first half hat trick. Cafone put the Hawkeyes up 1-0 with a goal in the 11th minute. She followed with two more quick scores in the 19th and 21st minute to give Iowa a 3-0 lead.

"I was very disappointed in that we had an exceptionally slow start and allowed Iowa to get too big of a jump on us," said head coach Helen Knull. "We need to play smarter and set the tone early."

Sophie Sunderland then scored her fourth goal of the season to give the Hawkeyes a 4-0 advantage at the break. Sunderland picked up her second goal of the game on a rebound in the 54th minute that made it 5-0.

After Matula netted the Spartans first goal of the game in the 62nd minute, freshman Kelsey Keener followed that up with a goal 43 seconds later to cut it to 5-2. With time winding down, Shelby Supica found Keener who beat the keeper again with a beautiful finish for her fourth goal of the season.

Katie Miller got the start and made one save, while Sierra Patton saw action in the second half and made three saves.

Iowa had nine shots on target to MSU's six, while corner opportunities were tied 4-4.

Michigan State returns home on Sunday to take on Ohio at Ralph Young Field at 1 p.m. Next Friday, MSU plays No. 10 Northwestern at home in its annual ‘Pink Game,' before hosting No. 18 Stanford on Sunday at 2 p.m. for Senior Day.