Team defeats West Coast rival

After last weekend's Stanford Invitational junior Melissa Pietras made a bold and confident statement about her Hoosier team heading into this weekend's Princeton Invitational.\n"It's now time for us to go out there and win some games, I don't see any reason why we shouldn't go undefeated this weekend," Pietras said. \nHer words proved to be prophetic as the Hoosiers beat rival and No. 10 University of California Santa Barbara 9-7 to go 4-0 on the weekend. The win over UC-Santa Barbara was the second time in school history that the Hoosiers have beaten a top 10 opponent, the first being at the Michigan Invitational when the Hoosiers beat No. 7 San Jose State, 10-8. Before this weekend the Hoosiers had never beaten UC-Santa Barbara in three meetings making this final game of the tournament especially sweet. \n"I am very pleased with how we played today," coach Barry King said in a statement. "It was so important for us, especially coming off last week at Stanford, to compete tough and beat a West Coast team. I feel that we established ourselves when we were out here. Leaving here 4-0 on the weekend is something we really were focused on doing." \nIn the first game of the tournament the Hoosiers easily took care of Bucknell University winning 13-3. The next game was much more challenging for the Hoosiers as they faced a traditionally strong team in No. 18 Brown. In the game Pietras and Senior Kristin Stanford each scored two goals as the Hoosiers won 5-3. Brown took an early lead against the Hoosiers as they quickly scored the first two goals of the game in the first quarter. \nBut the Hoosiers stormed back behind two goals from Stanford and one from Pietras to go into halftime leading 3-2. In the second half the Hoosiers scored two more goals before Brown scored a meaningless goal at the end of the game. \nIn Sunday's action the Hoosiers took on No. 19 Harvard. On paper the matchup looked very competitive, yet the Hoosiers turned the game into a blowout in a lopsided 8-2 victory. The game wasn't even as close as the score indicated. The Hoosiers could have shut Harvard out but they pulled starting goalie Jessica Goldner to give some playing time and experience to freshman Bridget McKeon. \nOn the offensive side of the ball the Hoosiers jumped on Harvard early and often as the Hoosiers exploded for seven goals in the first half. In the second quarter senior Jamie Marley, Stanford, Pietras, and sophomore Krista Peterson all scored. \nThe Hoosiers now have a couple weeks off before they host the Indiana Invite on Saturday, March 3.