The women's fall teams have excelled across the board for Tufts so far this September, and for the second week in a row, the rest of the NESCAC is taking notice.
Last week, it was senior co-captain Ileana Casellas-Katz scoring two goals in the field hockey team's season opener, earning the first NESCAC Player of the Week title of the year for the Jumbos. Yesterday, Tufts earned two more league-wide accolades, as sophomore Cara Cadigan won NESCAC Player of the Week honors in soccer and senior tri-captain Katy O'Brien was named the cross country NESCAC Performer of the Week.
Cadigan had two stunning performances over the weekend, as she had a hand in all four Tufts goals. She netted three on her own for the Jumbos, while assisting on the fourth. Saturday afternoon against Middlebury, Cadigan assisted on the game-tying goal in the 84th minute before tallying the decisive goal in double-overtime for a 2-1 Jumbo win.
Sunday, she provided all of the offense for Tufts herself, finishing two goals to power her team past Carthage, 2-0. After suffering a debilitating ACL tear before her first season at Tufts, Cadigan has carved herself out a dominant role on the team, having scored four of the team's six goals on the season.
O'Brien, the 2006 NESCAC Most Outstanding Performer, placed second at the UMass Dartmouth Invitational and first for Tufts with a time of 18:11 on the 5000-meter course. The Jumbos came away with an eighth-place showing for the race.
Amherst was the top NESCAC team in the race, with its top two finishers coming in third and fourth overall. However, this Lord Jeff duo of senior Heather Wilson and junior Elise Tropiano was edged out by O'Brien, who held on by a mere five seconds to beat her NESCAC foes and pick up an honor for her performance.
-by Evans Clinchy and Tim Judson
