Masuk Field Hockey secured an impressive win against Bethel on Wednesday, ending 6-0, during a foggy evening. The first goal was scored by sophomore Abigail Troesser at the 9:48 mark, with two more goals scored during the remainder of the first quarter by junior Grace Walker and sophomore Emma Troesser respectively, creating an early lead, and ending the first quarter 3-0.
Masuk’s pace did not slow down by much during the second quarter with two goals, the first scored by Walker at the 9:26 mark, and the second by senior Anna Tsichlas at the 0:50 second mark, going into half-time 5-0.
However, after half-time it was evident that Bethel had gotten its act together on the defensive end, only letting one goal in, scored by Molly Kinnahan at the 1:58 mark of the third quarter. Although Bethel had improved on defense, they were no match, and succumbed to Masuk’s field hockey team, who now carry a 4-3 record going into the remainder of the season.
Some players were posed with the question of what it takes to succeed in a game. “A lot of team effort, group-work, and communication overall for the team,” said senior goalie Valerie Vilca.
“We hype each other up on the sidelines. Because [in] the games where we haven’t done as well, we’ve been silent and we had that conversation with Coach Foley. She said, ‘we have to get louder, we’re not moving as fast as we normally would.’ and I think that really helped cause’ we started hyping each other up and we started scoring more,” added midfielder freshman Eve Fernandez said.
Unlike other games, the highlight of the evening was not during the game, but rather during Masuk field hockey’s fundraising events post game.
This Wednesday was Masuk field hockey’s third time organizing fundraising events for community members with cancer. This year’s recipient, Remy Dubay, is a two year old Monroe native, born with down syndrome and TMD (transient myeloproliferative disorder), a disorder that only occurs in patients with down syndrome and increases cancer risk.
In August, Remy was diagnosed with leukemia. More background on Remy Dubay, and more specifics of the event can be found here on The Monroe Sun.
The post game events began with the pulling of raffle prizes, ranging from gift certificates to money, and ended with giving the proceeds and flowers to members of the Dubay family that were in attendance.
Masuk Field Hockey has a short, but rich history of donating to individuals in the community.
“So what we do is in year’s past we just did a cancer awareness night for any cancer organization, and then we came upon a student in Fawn Hollow who was fighting cancer and we decided to give back to the community… Ever since then we like to find a community member to fundraise for…” said Laura Lawlor, Assistant Coach. “Last year was for Dawn Davis; she was fighting breast cancer, (and) has since passed. And then when I found out about Remy, I approached the other coaches. We just knew it was the right thing to do; He was the one we wanted to raise money for.”
She then highlighted the significance games like these have to the players with:“ We usually don’t have many supporters in our stands; We have parents come, and to have all these people cheering them on, and to know while they’re playing that they are doing good for somebody in the community … It’s their favorite night of the year.”
Players were also interviewed about how games like these have changed them as players. Senior midfielder Gwen Giugno said, “It makes me realize how important it is what we’re doing.”
Freshman defender Emily O’ Reilly also responded, “It’s really fun supporting people of the Monroe community, especially because they’re going to get older and go to Masuk, so it’s fun doing the charity events.”
Masuk Field Hockey has definitely harnessed a very unique style of fundraising, and are still open to donations via Venmo @Masuk-FieldHockey
Masuk Free Press 
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