It’s Final Four week! Before I leave for Durham to cover Northwestern one last time, let’s recap the Wildcats’ past weekend in Charlottesville. On Virginia’s Turf Field, the ‘Cats avoided a matchup against
the hosts entirely, instead defeating Yale 5-1 before taking down Miami-Ohio 3-2 in a nailbiter. Now, NU will head to its fifth consecutive championship weekend.
After this past weekend, Northwestern field hockey and lacrosse have now qualified for ten combined consecutive Final Fours. But after the NCAA Tournament draw, which saw Northwestern not hosting a regional for the first time since 2021, I wondered: What if this year’s field hockey team was the one to break the streak? Although I knew the Wildcats were capable of winning, Virginia was a very strong team likely seeking revenge after Northwestern beat it in the Elite Eight last season.
I should have known better.
The Wildcats didn’t even have to face the Cavaliers, who got upset by Miami-Ohio on their own home turf. They opened their NCAA Tournament with a lopsided 5-1 game against Yale, a game where it took a bit for Northwestern’s offense to get rolling. After about 20 minutes of Maddie Zimmer being the only player to generate several good chances, Ashley Sessa finally caught fire in the 27th minute by setting up a goal for Piper Borz.
Northwestern got one more on the board in the third before closing the game out with a three-goal onslaught. Borz, who hadn’t scored since Oct. 13 and comes off the bench regularly for NU, had the biggest moment of her career to date against the Bulldogs with two goals. Yale’s offense was sluggish all day, as it got held to just four shots, which gave the ‘Cats more room to find their groove through keeping the ball.
The Miami game, however, continued the trend of nerve-racking NCAA quarterfinals for Northwestern. The Wildcats scored early, but the RedHawks fired back each time as the game was tied 2-2 at halftime. Both teams upped their defensive intensity in the second half, but Miami still scared NU in the circle several times and had several opportunities to pull off a second consecutive upset. Eventually, the ’Cats prevailed, with Grace Schulze coming in clutch to score the game-winning goal with less than two minutes remaining.
Northwestern-Miami was one of the few games this season where the Wildcats didn’t dominate possession, despite outshooting the RedHawks 18-7. Miami’s pace tested the ‘Cats both offensively and defensively, as it improved considerably from the last three times it played them — all games where NU won by three or more goals. After all, there’s a reason why the RedHawks improved nine places in the NFHCA Coaches’ Poll from the last NU-Miami meeting in mid-September.
To qualify for its fifth consecutive national title, Northwestern must defeat No. 1 North Carolina in the NCAA semifinals. It will only get harder from here on out.
The Schulze Switch
I touched upon this in my gamer published a day after Sunday’s match, but one of the most noticeable changes amongst Northwestern’s lineup was that Schulze inserted on five of her team’s seven penalty corner attempts. This represents a significant shift from almost the entirety of the 2024 and 2025 seasons, where Sessa acted as NU’s primary inserter — Schulze did the job too, but only occasionally.
The change meant two things. One, that Sessa would be an additional attacking option near the center of the goal circle, and two, that Schulze would be positioned near the right side of the goal post, where she’d be able to grab rebounded shots or balls that barely roll past the cage. Schulze’s position was one that Sessa was in for most of the season, contributing to why Sessa had so many goals this season that were deflected in after an initial miss.
During the corner that led to Schulze’s game-winning goal, it’s easy to see how the decision to have her insert paid off. She scored from the exact position she was supposed to be in post-insert, one that she possibly wouldn’t have been in without that role. After all, Schulze leads Northwestern’s starters in shooting percentage (33.3%), so it makes sense to put her in a spot where she can finish shots easily. Likewise, with Sessa being Northwestern’s most prolific and creative scorer, it may not be a bad idea to give her more outside chances.
It’s unclear whether head coach Tracey Fuchs will continue with this strategy or if Sessa will return to her usual role. Sessa is still an extremely good inserter herself (the team struggled massively without her presence on corners against Louisville), but switching to Schulze clearly has its benefits as well.
Withholding the Whistle
Two of Northwestern’s three possible opponents in the Final Four, Princeton and North Carolina, have some of their best players taking the first shot on a penalty corner play. Princeton’s Beth Yeager has scored several go-ahead and game-winning goals off corners, including a goal that put the Tigers up 3-1 against the Wildcats. Meanwhile, UNC co-leading scorer Charly Bruder has what ACC commentators call a “big girl smash,” or a heavy strike that will surely give NU headaches on Friday.
As much as I trust Zimmer and Co. to be elite on corner defense, the key to ensuring that players like Yeager and Bruder don’t score is by preventing those corners from happening in the first place. That didn’t happen against the RedHawks, who drew two consecutive APCs shortly after Laura Salamanca’s opening goal, scoring on one of them. There were a few moments, especially in the first half, where I thought that Northwestern got a bit panicky inside Miami’s goal circle, resulting in several fouls before the defense cleaned up in the second half.
In fact, Northwestern’s last five goals allowed (extending back to the Michigan Big Ten semifinals game) have all been the result of some penalty, whether it be a corner or — even worse – a stroke attempt. The whistle was also a catalyst in the ‘Cats last two losses, as a Zimmer green card (and in the case of Princeton, a simultaneous Schulze green card) paved the way for both 2024 Michigan and 2025 Princeton to score against the team. Northwestern will need to play good defense in the Final Four, but that defense must be clean.
Weekly Awards
Player of the Week — Maddie Zimmer, graduate student midfielder: While it’s tempting to say Schulze solely because of the weight of the moment, Zimmer was consistently the most impactful player on the field across two games. She was the only one who could get going on offense in the early stages of the Yale game, and she ended that contest with a goal and an assist. In addition, she took a ball to the midsection on corner defense while trying to prevent a Yale goal. Against Miami, she also had several big-moment plays — she drew the corners that led to Salamanca and Schulze’s goal and also made a clutch tackle on RedHawk midfielder Justina Intzes, who would have otherwise faced a wide-open cage with the ball on her stick.
Play of the Week: Duh.
Around the NCAA
- In my opinion, No. 2-seeded Princeton’s Yeager is making a run for National Player of the Year. She’s the best player on her team and has shown up over and over in the postseason — she now has game-winners from the Ivy League tournament championship and Princeton’s Elite Eight Game against Syracuse, which sent the Tigers to their first Final Four since 2019. Any team facing Princeton in the Final Four should fear Yeager’s shot.
- Before Miami-Ohio fell at the hands of Northwestern, it pulled off the tournament’s biggest upset by defeating No. 4 Virginia on its home turf. The Cavaliers, who weren’t ranked below the top four of the coaches’ poll before the postseason, struck first but let the RedHawks score two unanswered to lose 2-1. The game marked Miami’s first round of 16 win in program history.
- No. 1-seeded North Carolina did not have it easy in its opening-round games. It had to first conquer its demons against Saint Joseph’s, the team that defeated the Tar Heels in the 2024 semifinals, in a tight first-round matchup. UNC then played Duke for the third time in three weeks, a match that required overtime for it to emerge victorious with a 2-1 score.
- After winning four individual ACC awards and being just one game away from an overall ACC regular season title, Wake Forest’s postseason ended in a dud. After losing in the first round of the ACC Tournament, the Demon Deacons pulled off the same feat in the NCAA tournament, falling 2-0 to a 12-9 UConn team.
What’s Next?
Northwestern now travels to Durham to take on North Carolina on Friday at 1:30 p.m. CT, in what will effectively be a road matchup against the crown jewel of the college game. Although the Tar Heels beat the Wildcats in their last two contests, the 2022 and 2023 NCAA title games, the Wildcats won their most recent non-championship match — a 2-0 win in the 2021 first round. There will be no shortage of star power and rich storylines in this one, so stay tuned for a more extensive preview of what has become one of the most competitive rivalries in NCAA field hockey.
