"Failure is the foundation of success, and the means by which it is achieved." (Lao Tzu) According to the book titled, The Power of Failure, in order to succeed more, you need to fail more and if you are not failing enough, then you need challenges that will allow you to double your failure rate along the way so that you can, in fact succeed in the long run. Pennsbury field hockey coach, Traci Curtis, ironically is loving what some doses of "failure" are doing for her team this season. What is crazy is that I was extremely upset about our 1-0 loss to Council Rock North just two days ago yet so happy with our 7-1 loss against North Penn today. How does that make sense? It makes sense because through our loss today I saw so many things come together for our team. The rollercoaster of emotions is exhausting, but it's all part of the process and historically how our season stories seem to flow each year. We knew what we were facing in our North Penn opponent and I believe our poor showing and humbling loss to CR North was the best preparation we could have had going into this game, explained Curtis. Our girls were forced to turn inward and do a gut check and you don't learn how to do that when things come easily - you learn how to do that when things are tough. Today the girls played with heart, fire, and unity, and we are really proud. North Penn was up 2-0 in the first quarter and then 5-0 by halftime, but our girls were handling the game well and playing at such a high level the entire time. It was our best hockey yet despite being down by so many goals and that was exciting to watch. North Penn is a strong, fast, sharp, smart, scrappy team backed by a great goalie. Their ability to find each other's sticks with pinpoint passing is outstanding and so difficult to defend. They forced our players to adjust quickly and read and react at a faster pace than ever. The Knights scored two more goals in the third quarter making it 7-0, but Pennsbury kept fighting with everything they had. Goalie, Jordan Vradenburgh, tallied 19 saves and senior defender, Reagan Ward, earned a defensive save during one of the many battles in the circle. Most of North Penn's goals were a result of good rebounding off pads and scrappy play in the circle. We held them to 7 corners, which says a lot about our defenders ability inside the 16 - for the amount of time NP was in our circle, it speaks volumes about how well our backs took care of the ball, moved their feet, and stayed under control. We are really proud of our backfield - Reagan Ward, Riley Henderson, Olivia Graebner, Gabby Darling, and Jordan Vradenburgh really put on a great show. The Falcons had only 2 offensive corner opportunities and 9 shots on goal, but did end up on the scoreboard in the fourth quarter with four minutes left in the game. Meg McClure did all the work to get the ball into the offensive circle and after a little scuffle, Siya Patel passed it to sophomore, Ayla Alon, who used her reverse stick to tip it into the corner past the North Penn goalie. It was a great heads up play and saved us from being shut out. The girls were determined to score before the game's end and they achieved it. Through, what may have appeared to be a terrible failure to some, came so much success from our perspective. We won small moments, which gave us big confidence. Today was a significant turning point as individuals and as a team. We did our best and what this game provided was priceless - it allowed our players to truly feel their potential and recognize their capabilities in themselves and each other. Kudos to North Penn for their consistent, high level play. We appreciate what they taught us out there and are grateful for how much we could take away from those 60 minutes together. Pennsbury is set to host Pennridge on Monday, travel to Souderton on Wednesday, and then come back home Friday to face CB East.