The assist as a statistic takes a backseat to the score in every team sport. You can do all the work, beat the defense and feed your teammate perfectly, all just to get second billing.
Sophomore attacker Allison Schindler may not always be the one slamming the ball past the goalie, but she has become the premier source of assists for women’s lacrosse team the past two seasons and is quickly making her mark in the Cornell record books. For that, she gets high praise from the team’s leading scorer, junior Kristen Smith.
“We all trust [Allison] as a player and know the way that she looks to unselfishly feed the ball,” said Smith. ” It’s great to always have a player near the goal who doesn’t only want to score.”
Schindler came to Cornell last year after starring in lacrosse, field hockey and basketball at St. Paul’s School for Girls in Maryland. On her college visits, she gravitated to Red head coach Jenny Graap’s ’86 program because, according to Schindler, ” I realized how much all the girls get along, and it was just a team that really had a personality similar to mine.”
Her statistics since then demonstrate just how well she has meshed with her teammates. Her 38 points as a freshman placed her third on the team, and her 28 assists that season ranked her seventh in the nation as well as first in Cornell history. Schindler fondly recalls the memory of earning the assist that set the single-season record in the final minutes of last season’s ECAC playoff victory against UMass. The fact that her pass set up the first career goal of classmate Lisa Giugliano made the moment ” really special,” she said.
“Even as a freshman, Allison was always confident with the ball in her stick and extremely precise with her passes,” said senior midfielder Jaime Quinn. “She knows where to pass the ball even before we get there.”
This season, despite the team’s struggle to post wins, Schindler has continued racking up points on assists. With 3 assists against Penn this past Saturday, Schindler now has 13 helpers on the season and 41 in her career, moving her into sole possession of sixth place on Cornell’s all-time career assist list.
“Allison has tremendous stick skills and superior vision, which lead to accumulating assists,” said Graap, whose 30 career assists were surpassed by Schindler earlier this season.
“Every team we play already knows from our statistics that she’s kind of a quarterback in the attacking end, and they try to pressure her or deny her feeds. The fact that she’s still being successful and putting up the numbers speaks to her ability.”
With more than half a career to go, Schindler is on pace to shatter the Cornell assist record of 69 set by Lori Wohlschlegel ’02.
Yet, in spite of her personal achievements, Schindler’s off-the-field demeanor is as unselfish as her play on it. Rather than watch her own star rise in the record books, she is currently focused on helping her team put together a winning second-half of the season.
” I read the articles and they kind of tell me where I am, but it’s not something I really pay attention to at all,” she said.
Archived article by Dan Schiff
Sun Staff Writer