Coming off of their first New Jersey Athletic Conference win this season with a 14-11 score against Rutgers-Camden, Ramapo was shutout by Montclair State 17-0 on Wednesday afternoon.
The first goal of the game was scored by Montclair junior Jenna Bussiere, who had two goals on the day. Junior attack Tierney Conlon scored the second and third goals shortly after, and ended with four goals for the day.
The Red Hawks of Montclair kept hitting the back of the net, goal after goal, never thinking twice about the Ramapo Roadrunner defense.
“We had the attitude that we had already lost, before the game even started,” said sophomore defender Itati Aburto.
The Red Hawks just kept firing at the goal, running up the score with 27 shots during the game. Comparatively, the Roadrunners had nine shot attempts, but did not land any on goal.
Ramapo goalkeeper, junior Reagan Vier, had seven saves on the day, but felt her team was unprepared mentally.
“I feel like we went into the game with a negative attitude; coming into it feeling like we were going to lose, and that’s exactly what happened,” said Vier on her team’s performance against Montclair.
Montclair, undefeated thus far into the season and on a 14-game winning streak, is a very talented team, but Ramapo fell short of their potential. They failed to do simple things in the game, such as recovering ground balls. Ramapo only picked up seven compared to Montclair’s 14 ground balls during the game.
However, the Roadrunners did force 10 Red Hawk turnovers, but even that could not be the saving grace Ramapo needed to come out victorious.
The Roadrunners trailed 14-0 after the first 30 minutes of play.
During the second half, Montclair built up their lead to 17 by adding three more goals to the scoreboard. Ramapo was still unable to score in the second half.
Ramapo’s nine shots on the game, with Montclair blocking three, were mainly wide, missing the goal. Sophomore attack Lindsay Hughes made up most of the shot attempts with six, while only two of her other teammates had attempts on the Montclair net.
“Montclair’s a really good team, but at the same time we didn’t play our best,” said Vier. “But at the end of the day we can only learn from it and move forward.”
This loss was especially brutal for the Roadrunners, who suffered another NJAC loss earlier in the season to the fifth nationally ranked TCNJ with a similar outcome, a 19-0 shutout defeat.
Ramapo has three more conference games coming up to complete their 2014 season, and then the NJAC conference tournament, if they make it in.
Ramapo is now 4-6 on the season and 1-2 in the conference, and currently ranked fifth in the NJAC. Their next game will be another NJAC contest on the road at Rowan on Saturday.
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lforese@ramapo.edu
