The Quakers had a golden opportunity to fire up the squad heading into halftime when they were awarded a penalty corner at the conclusion of the first half. But Penn was unable to capitalize and the Lions took a 1-0 lead into the intermission.
The Quakers were thinking upset when a scramble around the Penn State goal resulted in a Liz Lorelli score, bringing the game to a 1-1 tie, three-and-a-half minutes into the second half. But the Quakers were never able to take advantage of their opportunities, as they failed on six penalty corners throughout the evening.
In a 1-1 war with about 25 minutes remaining in the contest, sophomore Neilye Stoner made the play of the game. Following up a restart in Penn territory, Stoner took a page out of Duke's basketball playbook. Stoner posted up her defender and controlled the ball with her back to the goal. With a quick shake-and-bake she shimmied her defender and fired a backhanded sweep shot for the eventual game winner.
The play was seemingly identical to Christian Laettner's storied game winner over Kentucky in the 1992 NCAA Tournament East Regional Final. Stoner also flashed her defensive savvy when her and goalie Annie Zinkavich contributed to make back-to-back defensive denials within a minute, as Penn attempted penalty corners in the first half.
After Stoner's go ahead goal, the Nittany Lions never looked back. After attempting two consecutive unsuccessful penalty corners on back-to-back plays, the Lions finally cashed in on their third penalty corner in as many plays. Following a Kulina shot, Kelly Concini rebounded Wilhelm's deflection to put Penn State ahead, 3-1. Concini later added her second goal of the night on another penalty corner to put the Lions ahead 4-1, and junior Timarie Legel added the final goal of the night off a brilliant pass from senior Meredith Shulzitski to put a lopsided 5-1 tally on the board.
Kulina, perhaps playing her final game at home, played with a passion for all 70 minutes, as she got dirty on the Bigler Field turf, denying numerous passes on defense and intimidated Penn's goalie with a variety of smoking slapshots.
"It didn't hit me until the national anthem," Kulina said. "I had tears in my eyes. It was a little sad."
An overmatched Penn team made a courageous effort to just stick around with the Lions for so long.
"I thought we played a great first half", said Penn coach Val Cloud. "Penn State played a totally different second half. They picked up the pace."
Head Coach Charlene Morett was very pleased with her team's performance, although she did stress the importance for the team to play two good halves in a row heading into this weekend's game at Indiana, followed by the Big Ten Championships.
"I'd like to see more consistent defense," said Morett. "I'd like to see us play more disciplined defense, and we really didn't do that tonight."
The Lions are streaking with the Big Ten Tournament on the horizon. With big Uncle "Mo"mentum on their side, the Lions have the ability to make a run, and turn some serious heads while doing it.
