If Yanks could do it, why not Monroe?

By: Sean Richards
   The Monroe Township High School field hockey team must feel like the New York Yankees did when they went through a rough stretch early in the season.
   No matter what the team or what the sport, everybody has their down periods when nothing seems to work.
   Yes, Monroe is still looking for its first win of the year. No, the Falcons are not mentally devastated and remain confident things will turn around.
   "What are you going to do?" rhetorically asked Monroe coach Virginia Gonzalez. "All we can do is go back to the drawing board and continue to work."
   Heading into Wednesday’s home game against South Brunswick, Monroe’s latest results were not good. The first team lost to East Brunswick, 4-0, and then fell to Sayreville, 2-0.
   Those results left the Falcons at 0-4-2 on the year. Even more frustrating is the fact it has still only scored two goals this season and none since way back on Sept. 9. Both goals belong to senior standout Meghan Stark.
   "We’ve tried everything," said Gonzalez. "We’ve had our forwards play in the back, we’ve had our backs play up front and we’ve put the middies everywhere. Girls have even come up to me and said, ‘I’ve never played here before.’
   "We’re just trying to shake it up and see if we can’t get something to happen. "
   Although Monroe does have some young starters and has never been a big scoring team, Gonzalez didn’t anticipate the biggest draught since Oklahoma was turned into a dust bowl during the Great Depression.
   "I didn’t think we’d score a lot, but this is unbelievable," agreed Gonzalez. "My leading scorer from last year was Nicole (Manziano), and she hasn’t scored yet. Meghan has been great and has the two goals off corners, but we thought we’d be able to score more than this.
   "Today (Monday) I felt sick. It was just wrong that we didn’t score (against Sayreville)."
   Despite the fact October is rapidly approaching, don’t give up on the Falcons just yet. Gonzalez has been here before and seen her team respond.
   "We’ve usually been a second half team and, hopefully, that will kick in," said Gonzalez. "We’re also not out of the (Greater Middlesex) conference race. One of our losses was out of conference and we have the two ties keeping us in things.
   "It’s easy to be a team when you’re winning. When you aren’t, sometimes you see people getting down and finger pointing. I haven’t seen any of that. The girls are hanging in there."
   Monroe is scheduled to host South Plainfield today (Friday) and Old Bridge Tuesday.
   And in case no one has noticed, the Yankees carried the best record in the Major Leagues into the week. If they can do it, why not the resilient Falcons?