COLUMN: It's do or die for field hockey
Followers of the field hockey team, who do not venture out of Mount Pleasant to see road games, saw Central Michigan for the first time last weekend.
What they were eyewitness to was not pretty. In fact, if they had not looked at the previous results, they would be surprised to hear the Chippewas beat a top-25 team this season.
CMU lost two games by a total of six goals over three days.
More crushing than its 4-1 loss to No. 13 Iowa Sunday, was its 4-1 loss to Miami Friday.
The experienced team has its sights set on a Mid-American Conference championship, though it made it awfully difficult to accomplish with a loss right off the bat.
With four conference games remaining, CMU needs to win out and have Miami lose twice to have a shot at finishing in first place.
“We definitely made getting into the tournament a lot harder today, and winning a league championship, even harder.” senior Erin Dye said after Friday’s game.
And then there is the tournament as Dye mentioned.
New this year, the MAC has limited the number of teams that will make it into the tournament to four, instead of letting every team compete as it has in years past.
So, if the Chippewas lose their next conference game against Ball State, they will have more to worry about than winning a championship.
Now, surely there is no reason CMU should not at least make it to the tournament and destroy the lowly Cardinals, but there is not much room to trip up.
You cannot put into words how disappointing missing the tournament would be for this team, which has all of the pieces to do much better than just appear in it.
The Chippewas need their experienced players to lead the team with only four more conference games.
Whether they rebound swiftly and win a regular season conference championship, just make the tourney, or miss it completely, it will all be decided at the CMU Field Hockey Complex.
The Chippewas host Ohio and Kent State during the last two weeks of the season. CMU can also add another top-25 win or two to its resume with No. 20 Michigan State and No. 15 Michigan still on its home schedule this season.
