Syracuse Loses Senior Day Heartbreaker Against Wake Forest 2-1 in Penalty Strokes

By Max Gifford | @GiffMD

Home is where the heart is, and for four members of No. 10 Syracuse field hockey, that place of refuge has been at J.S Coyne Stadium their entire career. However, in their senior day, they experienced nothing short of heartbreak. SU was edged 2 to 1 by Wake Forest after the Demon Deacons gained a 5-4 advantage in penalty strokes. With the regular season done and postseason play looming, Head coach Lynn Farquhar says the best is yet to come for her squad.

“I think we haven’t peaked yet. So that’s an exciting piece. It definitely wasn’t the outcome we wanted out there. However, you can see there were opportunities. So it’s coming together for each other. There’s a lot of great things for us. We always want to drop the W on people.”

The contest culminated with Syracuse senior Eefke van den Nieuwenhof missing a penalty stroke in the sixth round of the shootout after two ten minute overtime periods had been played.

“[It was a] heartbreaking moment, but then I’m so excited, and you have so much respect for what’s going to happen”, said Coach Faqruhar.

Wake Forest was the only team in the ACC before this game that hadn’t won a game in conference play.

After the game, SU celebrated its four seniors, Charlotte de Vries, Sienna Pegram, Eefke van den Nieuwenhof, and Pieke van de Pas in a postgame ceremony.

Barring any Cinderella run, this game marked the final home tilt for the Orange in 2023. Next for the ‘Cuse the ACC tournament next Tuesday in Charlottesville. It was announced shortly after the contest, Syracuse would play against 4th seeded Virginia slated as the 5th seed in the tourney. First push from Turf Field for the quarterfinal matchup is on Tuesday at 1 p.m.