The Salisbury field hockey came out on fire and put Northwestern back on its heels early in last week’s game.

Unfortunately for Salisbury, it wasn’t able to take advantage of the quick start and wound up going to overtime before falling to the Tigers 1-0 last week. The game, originally scheduled to be at Northwestern, was moved to Northern Lehigh’s turf field because the Northwestern field was unplayable due to recent rains.

Salisbury (3-6-0 Colonial, 4-6-0 overall) controlled the first 15 minutes of play, but eventually Northwestern (4-3-1 , 4-4-1) started to turn the tide over the final 15 minutes of the first half and regained control of the game. In the second half, the Falcons also took control early and had three corners in the first three minutes of the half, but again they were unable to take advantage of the momentum and the game remained scoreless.

“They’re learning to pass better and play better and play harder,” said Salisbury head coach Jane Brennan. “It was a lot of back-and-forth and a lot of opportunities, but we just couldn’t finish it, couldn’t put the ball in the net. It’s been hit-or-miss. We started out beating Moravian Academy and were 3-0 and lost a couple, but we’ve been scoring every game, so we know how to do it. Today we couldn’t finish.”

In overtime, Northwestern’s Sydney Derr seemed destined to score. She made a mad dash down the left side of the field and launched a shot that went wide of the goal with 13:50 left in the overtime period. A little over two minutes later, she made much the same dash but with slightly less interference in front of her and was able to fire a shot on mark that made it past goalie Josie DuBois for the 1-0 win.

DuBois was thrust into the starting role because of an injury to Emily Silberman. Dubois had just one practice prior to taking over the starting role.

“She’s not inexperienced,” said Brennan. “We’re fortunate from that standpoint in that she has played and she’ll do a nice job for us. It was just throwing her in this quickly against a good team is a difficult position for anyone.”

There is no immediate indication on how long Silberman will be out of the lineup.

The up-and-down season continued with a 4-2 loss to Palmerton on Saturday.

The Lady Falcons have Colonial League games at Palisades (0-7-0, 1-7-0) and at home against Wilson (4-3-0, 6-3-0) before a rematch with Northwestern next Tuesday at home. In between the Wilson and Northwestern games is a nonconference game against Whitehall (2-6-0EPC, 2-7-0 overall) on the road.

“We have some tough teams to play on the schedule,” said Brennan. “If we play the way we’re capable, I have no doubt that we can qualify for districts and we could look to surprise some teams at that point. We just have to stick with what we know works for us and play hard the rest of the way.”