Cornell's women's soccer team closes its season Saturday against Dartmouth, with a chance to reach six wins for the first time since 2015 and influence the Ivy League Tournament field. The Senior Night match begins at 6 p.m. at Berman Field in Ithaca.
The Big Red enters at 5-7-3 overall and 1-4-1 in league play, while Dartmouth is 10-3-2 and 4-2, according to Cornell's matchup preview. The Nov. 7 match will stream on ESPN+, with Alex Weiss handling play-by-play and Will Glasser providing analysis.
Cornell would finish 6-7-3 with a victory, its most wins since a 9-4-4 season in 2015. A draw would match last season's 5-7-4 record. A second conference win would also give Cornell multiple Ivy victories in three straight seasons for the first time since 2014-16, matching its two league wins in both 2024 and 2025.
Dartmouth needs a result to secure its place
The defending Ivy tournament champion is third with 12 points, one behind co-leaders Brown and Columbia. Harvard and Princeton have 10 points each, followed by Penn with six, Cornell with four and Yale with none.
Dartmouth clinches a tournament berth with a win or draw. A loss would eliminate the Big Green only if Harvard beats Columbia and Princeton beats Brown. Dartmouth could still advance after a defeat if either Columbia or Brown wins or draws.
The visitors can earn the No. 1 seed only by winning while both Brown and Columbia lose or draw. A Cornell win or draw would prevent Dartmouth from taking the top seed.
Dartmouth has been much stronger at home, finishing 8-0 at Burnham Field. It is 2-3-1 away from Hanover, including losses in both of its Ivy road matches, at Columbia and Princeton. Its latest result was a 2-0 win over Yale on Oct. 31.
Gibbons and Kerrigan approach milestones
Senior midfielder Emily Gibbons leads Cornell with five goals, two assists and 12 points. She is the program's third player since 2015 to reach five goals, joining Ava Laden and Laken Gallman. Another goal would make her Cornell's fifth player since 2007 with at least six in a season.
Freshman goalkeeper Sofia Kerrigan has five clean sheets, tied with Sherrie Chocola's 1984 total for third-most by a Cornell freshman. One more would tie Kate Alexander's six in 1992 for second; Kate Thompson holds the freshman record with nine in 1983.
Kerrigan leads Ivy goalkeepers with 3.79 saves per match, totaling 53 in 14 appearances. Her .697 save percentage ranks fourth in the conference. She shares second in the league in clean sheets with Columbia's Samantha Mahoney, behind Dartmouth's Ola Goebel, who has nine.
Cornell has recorded at least five shutouts in consecutive seasons for the first time since 2013-16. Another would give the team its most since 2015, when it matched the program record of 12.
The Big Red has scored in 62 of 94 matches under coach Rob Ferguson, a 65.96% rate that ranks third among the program's head coaches. Cornell has scored in 20 of its last 31 matches dating to last season's opener.
Penalty kicks and a high-scoring win mark the season
Cornell's three penalty-kick goals tie the program's single-season record from 1987. Gibbons scored the record-tying penalty 54 seconds into the Sept. 26 Ivy opener, a 1-0 win over Yale that also produced Cornell's most recent shutout.
Sophomore defender Raya Leikin scored the first two penalties against Lafayette on Aug. 27, becoming the first Cornell player to convert multiple penalties in one match. She was also the first Big Red defender with a multi-goal match since Miki Agrawal in 1997 and the first Cornell player with multiple penalty-kick goals in a season since Amy Snow in 1991.
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The team's 6-1 win over Holy Cross on Oct. 13 produced its most goals since a 7-0 victory over Delaware State in 2010. Seven assists tied for second-most in a match in program history, while 19 points tied for fifth. Hayes Wheeler scored at 89:59, the latest regulation goal in Cornell history.
Big Green brings one of the nation's strongest defenses
Dartmouth has allowed eight goals in 15 matches, a rate of 0.53 per match that ranks ninth in Division I. Its team save percentage of .862 ranks 10th, and its .600 shutout percentage ranks 19th, according to Cornell.
Goebel has played every minute in goal and leads the Ivy League with a 0.53 goals-against average, an .860 save percentage and nine shutouts. She has twice earned the league's Defensive Player of the Week award this season.
Madison Rose leads Dartmouth with 15 points and seven assists. Emmanuella Frimpomaa has a team-high six goals, including two against Yale, while 2025 Ivy tournament MVP Stephanie Lathrop has two goals and three assists.
Saturday is the teams' 46th meeting. Dartmouth leads the series 29-11-5 and won last year's match 2-1 in Hanover, but Cornell has won four of the last five meetings in Ithaca, including 1-0 victories in 2022 and 2024. The home team has won each of the last six matchups, and the last five have all been decided by one goal.
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