Whatever reservations there were about the No. 7 Penn State women's field hockey team's offensive line were quickly dismissed this weekend.

Yesterday, the Nittany Lions (6-2) defeated the West Chester Rams (1-7) 6-0, and on Friday, they scored four quick goals against the Lafayette Leopards (1-5) in a 4-0 win, extending their winning streak to six games.

"We got on the attack pretty quickly," head coach Char Morett said. "West Chester is really very aggressive, so I thought we played really well."

The Lions' attack was potent against West Chester. Junior Shaun Banta scored three goals yesterday, giving her a team-leading seven on the year. Sophomore Allison Scola also played well, scoring the first two goals of the game. Senior Kiersten Wood put away the Rams, scoring the Lions' sixth goal of the day.

On Friday, four goals in fifteen minutes proved to be enough for the Lions. Just three minutes into the game, senior Carey Maser scored the first goal off a corner. Banta quickly added two of her own in the next five minutes and junior Natalie Blasco scored once more to cap off the Lions scoring.

Before the floodgates opened and rained down on the Leopards, Morett told her team to play more defensively and spent the rest of the game getting playing time for all but two of her bench players.

"I'm not one to run up the score but I do like us to continue to keep possession and play at a good tempo," Morett said. "I felt that we did a nice job in the first half, controlling the pace of the game and possession, but I felt that we got a little hectic in the second half and played more individually instead of team possession."

Defensively, Penn State also had two great games this weekend. After the first 15 minutes on Friday, the Lions did not do much to excite the crowd at AstroTurf field. They did not, however, allow the Leopards to score and continued their staunch defense against West Chester, giving goalie Jen Beaumont her third and fourth shutouts of the year. Both Maser and sophomore Jen Long played well on defense, keeping up with the constant change of players.

During Friday's game, a ball deflected off Wood's stick and into her face, forcing her to leave the game with a bloody nose. She did return in the second half.

Penn State has one more game before it opens up conference play. Morett is hoping this weekend's games and Wednesday's contest against Penn will give her team enough practice to be able to defend its Big Ten Championship when it meets Michigan State next Friday.

"I spoke to the girls in a team meeting and I told them that even though this is a non-conference game, we really have to elevate our level of play," Morett said. "I really thought that we did a lot of nice things today."