Field Hockey team wins 16th PSAC Championship

Maggey Bloskey’s (Danville/Danville) goal in overtime gave the Bloomsburg University team a 2-1 win over Shippensburg in the championship game of the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) field hockey playoffs. The title is the 16th overall and third straight in the great career of Huskies head coach Jan Hutchinson who has announced her retirement at the end of the 2010 softball season (a sport she also coaches).

Bloskey’s goal came on a rebound of a shot by Erin Hench (Loysville/West Perry) that was saved by Shippensburg goalie Amanda Houser 13 minutes into the extra period.

Bloomsburg had a couple of scoring chances in the first half getting three corners in the first 20 minutes of play, but were not able to convert. Shippensburg scored the first goal of the game on its first penalty corner of the game. Taylor Jones scored off an assist from Ashley Jones at the 21:11 mark to put the Lady Raiders on top.

The Huskies did have three more penalty corners and managed two shots on goal, but no goals leaving it a 1-0 game at the break.

In the second half the Huskies kept the pressure on getting three penalty corners in the first seven minutes of play. On the third corner of the half Breanne Tobin (Perkasie/Pennridge) took a pass from Bloskey and tied the game with a goal at the 42:03 mark.

In the closing minutes of the regulation play Bloomsburg had a great opportunity to go in front on a couple of penalty corners, but Houser made two saves while one shot was blocked forcing overtime.

Bloskey has come up big against Shippensburg in the playoffs before. In last year’s NCAA semi-finals she scored three goals to help the Huskies down the Lady Raiders and advance to the NCAA title game.

For Bloomsburg, goalie Caitlin Koczynski (Yardley/Neshaminy) made six saves in the win.

Bloomsburg, 20-1, will now await word on Monday about the NCAA playoffs which begin on Nov. 7 with quarterfinal games.