Back in the preseason, our panel went around and picked the one game we were most excited about. A few said Boston College. More picked the North Carolina rematch.
I said this one. Northwestern at Maryland. April 9.
Turns out I was right to buy into the hype.
Kelly Amonte Hiller returns to her old stomping grounds on Thursday. She was a four time All American and two time national champion at Maryland. Now she is the winningest coach in Northwestern history with eight national titles.
Her No. 4 Northwestern
team heads to College Park on Thursday to face an undefeated and top ranked Terrapins squad. The Wildcats have won five straight in this series. Maryland has not beaten Northwestern since 2022. The Wildcats are the only team the Terrapins have a losing record against all time. That is 13-12 favoring Northwestern, according to the Terps own history page.
But this is a different Maryland team. 13-0. At home. With a one goal loss in last year’s Big Ten Championship still lingering. The Terrapins held a 6-2 lead at halftime of that game and watched it slip away.
They will have a chip on their shoulder to try and prevent that from happening again.
Here are three keys for the ‘Cats to repeat history at SECU Stadium.
1. The draw circle decides everything
Northwestern leads the Big Ten in draw controls per game at 17.25. Maddie Epke is the active NCAA leader in career draws with 525. She is tied for seventh all time among NCAA Division I players with UConn’s Sydney Watson. She pulled down a season high 15 draws against North Carolina on March 25. That is the same game Northwestern beat the then-No. 1 team in the country.
Not to be outdone, Madison Smith has 89 draws in 12 games this season. She missed most of 2025 after an injury ended her sophomore campaign six games in. Now she is back and averaging 7.42 draws per game, and her work as a draw specialist has been a huge part of NU’s recent success. She has posted double digit draws three times, including 10 at Oregon on March 21. As a team, the Wildcats have 209 total draws which is best in the conference.
Yet, Maryland is not far behind. Kayla Gilmore has 78 draws. Kori Edmondson, the reigning Big Ten Midfielder of the Year and former No. 1 overall recruit in the class of 2022, has 47 more. The Terrapins rank second in the Big Ten in draw percentage.
The last time these two met, Northwestern won the draw battle just enough to escape with an 8-7 win in the Big Ten Championship. That margin is razor thin. If the Wildcats lose possession consistently against a Maryland offense that scores 14.46 goals per game, they will be in trouble.
Smith needs another double digit draw performance. Epke needs to be everywhere. This is the most important matchup on the field.
2. Both teams have a statistical weakness, but fixing one will attack the other.
Northwestern’s flaw is shooting accuracy. The Wildcats rank seventh in the Big Ten in shots on goal percentage at 70.7 percent. That is not ideal for a team that takes 34 shots per game. Against USC in front of a program record 5,805 fans at Lacrosse Day in Chicago, free position shots clanged off the crossbar. Annabel Child, a midseason All American, saw her free position shot thunder off the iron. Madison Taylor hit the post. The offense scored the first six goals of the game then spent the next three quarters looking for a rhythm. That cannot happen against J.J. Suriano.
But here is the thing. That is fixable. Better shot selection. Slowing down. Picking corners. This team has the talent to clean that up overnight. They have done it before. They put up 17 goals on North Carolina just two weeks ago.
Maryland’s weakness is different. The Terrapins have allowed 12 goals per game across their last three contests against Rutgers, Ohio State, and Penn State. None of those teams have Madison Taylor.
Taylor leads the Big Ten with 78 points and 58 goals. She is second in the country in goals per game at 4.83. She just became the second player in program history and Big Ten history to reach 300 career goals, joining Izzy Scane. She is the consensus No. 1 overall pick in the upcoming WLL Draft. She is the game plan, and nobody has stopped her yet. She has 422 career points, the most among all active NCAA Division I players, and she sits 61 points behind Scane’s program record of 483.
If Northwestern puts shots on frame, Maryland’s defense will crack. They have already shown they can.
3. The goalie who makes the big save wins
This is the key within the key. Two of the best goalies in the country. Two different stories to get there.
Jenika Cuocco has 102 saves this season, second most in the conference. She has 684 career saves, the most among all active NCAA Division I players. She posted a 64.3 percent save clip against USC, her second highest mark of the season. She has 32 saves in her last three games. She was named IWLCA Defensive Player of the Week and Big Ten Defensive Player of the Week on March 31 after posting 23 stops in the Wildcats’ two top 10 wins over North Carolina and Johns Hopkins. She has already beaten the No. 1 team in the country once this season, making 12 saves in the overtime win over North Carolina, including a crucial stop in overtime. In her Wildcat debut, she set a new program record for saves in a season opener with 16 against Boston College.
J.J. Suriano leads the Big Ten and the NCAA with a 53 percent save percentage. She ranks third in the country with 133 saves. She is the reason Maryland is undefeated. She has faced and beaten ranked opponents including Syracuse, Virginia, Princeton, and Johns Hopkins. She is statistically the best goalie in the country right now.
But here is what makes this interesting. Cuocco has played a harder schedule. She has faced Boston College, North Carolina, Syracuse, Johns Hopkins, among others that tested her late. She has seen elite shooters in big moments. Suriano has been great, but she has not faced anyone quite like Madison Taylor.
When the game is tight in the fourth quarter and Taylor or Maryland’s LaPointe is cutting down the alley, which goalie makes the save? Cuocco has done it before against North Carolina. Suriano has the numbers to do it too.
Thursday night tells us who rises.
The bottom line
These two programs have combined for nine of the last ten Big Ten tournament championships. Northwestern has five. Maryland has four. They have won 22 NCAA titles between them. Northwestern trails Maryland by six. Every time they play, it matters.
The Wildcats are 3-2 against No. 1 ranked teams since 2023, the most wins in the nation. They already beat North Carolina when the Tar Heels were at the top of the rankings. They can do it again.
But streaks do not matter when the clock starts. This is a different Maryland team. Undefeated. At home. With something to prove.
The Wildcats need to win the draw. They need to shoot better than they did against USC. And they need Cuocco to be the best goalie on the field.
I picked this game back in February because I knew it would matter. It matters even more than I thought.
