Freshman midfielder Tayler Evans isn’t flashy in the way she plays. In fact, she’s quite the opposite.

In her native Australia, Evans learned how to win games with raw physicality. Because substitutions are anomalies in the land down under, she had no choice but to build up her endurance as well.

“If you’re one of those soft people and you go off, then you probably shouldn’t be on the field,” Evans said. “The culture in Australia is you got to take it. You can’t just run off the field and go, ‘Oh, I’ve had enough. I’m tired and I’m sore.’”

Even now, she isn’t allowed to take many breaks.

Evans has started all 16 games this season for the No. 3 Orange (14-2, 3-2 Atlantic Coast) and played every single minute in six of them. Although she hasn’t scored since registering her first career goal against Kent State on Sept. 8, she has logged valuable minutes for a team that heavily relies on younger players in pressure situations.

“We prepare really hard and we trust them,” head coach Ange Bradley said of Evans and the other freshmen on the squad. “We train under pressure and train with a clock. I try to be really intense so that when they get into these moments, they’re prepared.”

The latest of these pressure-cookers came Sunday in the form of a 3-2 overtime victory against Cornell.

With the game tied at two in the closing minutes of regulation, Evans made a play that nearly propelled the Orange to victory.

As a Cornell back began to carry the ball toward the Big Red 25-yard line, Evans reached in with her stick and knocked it away. An obstruction violation on the ensuing rush drew a penalty corner for Syracuse.

The Orange couldn’t convert on the opportunity, but generated momentum for the extra period that followed.

“You’ve just got to take your moments,” Evans said. “They were very condensed and playing 11-man defense, and it’s just really hard to get the spaces open and get through a defense like that.”

She said it all comes back to the forceful style of play she developed during the earlier stages of her field hockey career. At Brisbane State High School, Evans was able to throw her weight around on the field against more physical opponents.

But playing at the NCAA level has provided its own set of challenges.

“It was a little more contact, a little more aggressive, so we would get a lot harder tackles,” Evans said. “But I’ve found the umpires here are a lot more harsh on that, so I’ve toned it down a lot so I don’t get sent off.”

Still, her ability to make adjustments and contribute to the team’s overall balance allowed her to immediately fit into Syracuse’s system.

“It’s great because we don’t have that one solo star,” forward Serra Degnan said. “It’s teamwork that makes us who we are, not one solo player.”

Now that her first season with the Orange is winding down, Evans said she definitely made the right decision by joining the Orange. Although there were a few bumps at the start, she feels the team atmosphere is currently among the best she has ever experienced.

More importantly, her ability to balance strength and finesse has helped Syracuse become a legitimate contender.

“I wasn’t really expecting to be a top team at all,” Evans said. “We weren’t gelling so well in the preseason, and now I feel like we’re a great team and we can definitely win it.”

Published on October 28, 2013 at 10:24 pm

Contact Tyler: tfpiccot@syr.edu