Out With the Old? Never

Old Dominion powers onward despite drought

Aug. 23, 2007

By Elliot Olshansky

CSTV.com


	ELLIOT OLSHANSKY Elliot is CSTV.com's hockey editor and runs his Rink Rat hockey blog on CSTV.com. E-mail here!

Six years really isn't that long to wait between titles, is it?

It might be when you've never had to wait that long before.

The NCAA began sponsoring a championship in field hockey in 1981, and it didn't take long for Old Dominion to start winning. The Monarchs captured the crown for the first time in 1982 and followed with two more in quick succession. Connecticut won its second title in 1985 to break the streak, but ODU came back to win in 1988 and started another run of three titles in 1990. North Carolina entered what had previously been the sole dominion of the Monarchs in 1997 when the Tar Heels won their third straight title, but Old Dominion returned to the pinnacle again in 1998 and 2000.

Since the first year of the NCAA championship, only the classes of 1996 and 1997 had gone without titles after four years at Old Dominion. Now, though, Monarchs head coach Beth Anders has graduated three straight classes without national championships.

Not that she chooses to see it that way, of course.

"The consistency and standard that our program has maintained, I'm really proud of our program," Anders said. "I'm really proud of our tradition and our players and what they stand for, who they are. Not being in the finals for six years, I never even thought about it. I could never look at it that way, because I do think we've been successful in many ways. I'm proud of where we are. As far as getting back, I'd say we're still there."

Of course, Anders has good reason to accentuate the positive. The Monarchs have won four Colonial Athletic Association titles in the six years they've gone without the big prize and have yet to miss an NCAA tournament.

Next season, however, could prove as difficult a year for the Monarchs as they've seen in quite some time.

Last year saw the Monarchs earn the top seed in their region for the NCAA tournament but fall to Princeton in the first round. That team is virtually unrecognizable now, with the top five scorers all gone, most notably First Team All-American Caroline Nichols and Third Team selections Dana Sensenig and Denise Admiraal. Those top five scorers accounted for 62 of the 84 goals ODU scored last year, which leaves a daunting task for the 2007 Monarchs if they hope to keep up the tradition.

"I still think we're in the mix, still teaching the game, and still doing very well at it," Anders said. "As far as losing players, that's the norm. You're going to build them, and then you're going to lose them. You get players who have the same desire that your former players had, and it's just a matter of finding out what they can do and how they do it, and to put them together. You miss players, but you don't try to reproduce the players. You try to take what you have, figure out what they can do, take their heart, take their desire and put them as a team."

The top coaches in the nation are eager, as always, to match their teams up against the Monarchs. The 2007 Old Dominion schedule includes two games each against Maryland, Duke and North Carolina as well as a game against Virginia. The Monarchs have more games scheduled against teams from the ACC than does league member Boston College, to say nothing of the other top teams that are lined up to face them, like Penn State, Connecticut and Michigan.

The coaches of the other top programs in the nation know that, regardless of the personnel, there are certain things that the Monarchs will always have.

"It's a real game," said Maryland head coach Missy Meharg. "It's always played with such earnest hockey. You can rely on good combinations, full-field running, great tactics. It creates a lot of pressure. There's great energy in that game, because these women work so hard. They set the bar. To play them early in September and then the middle of October, it gives really good guidelines as to where we are."

Not surprisingly, all of that starts with their coach.

"A lot of it comes from Beth Anders," junior back Katelyn Smither said. "She has an incredible work ethic that she brings to the field every day, to start with. The people that we look to as our teammates, we bring in people that want to work hard, want to get better and want to learn. I think the combination of Beth coming out every day with that intensity and that drive and that fire, you can't help but look to follow right behind her. You're right there with her every day."

The question remains, of course, as to whether the Monarchs' enthusiasm and work ethic will be enough to make up for what the Monarchs lost. Not that it will be heart and hard work alone, of course -- high school All-American Loran Hatch headlines the Monarchs' recruiting class -- but the Monarchs certainly have their work cut out for them.

The other thing that's certain, though, is that the Monarchs will do whatever they can to do their school's name proud. After all, they know what the name means.

"Playing for Old Dominion is an honor," Smither said. "To be able to put that uniform on and go represent all the tradition behind it, to play for Beth Anders, it's just very humbling because you go out there and you know that people who were on that same field before you worked hard, so you're working just as hard if not harder to uphold what you stand for. That's hard work, dedication, determination and to go out there and leave everything that you have out on the field."