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Eefke van den Nieuwenhof learned how to take penalty corners from her mom, Marlies Vossen — a former field hockey professional in the Netherlands. Vossen held training sessions for van den Nieuwenhof and her two younger sisters, Noor and Julie, growing up.

The trio practiced at local Soest fields and in their backyard. That’s where van den Nieuwenhof first began to perfect her craft.

“(My mother) was very good at the penalty corner shot that we do,” van den Nieuwenhof said. “My penalty corner shot, I fully owe to my mom because she was so good at and taught me when I was younger.”

Van den Nieuwenhof is now Syracuse’s penalty shot specialist. She’s scored 24 goals in 52 games across three seasons with SU. Her penalty corner prowess has led to two First Team All-ACC and two NFHCA All-American selections. Now, van Den Nieuwenhof is in her second consecutive season as Syracuse’s captain.

Van den Nieuwenhof began playing at 4 with Vossen as her coach until she could play for a club team. “She began playing when she was old enough to hold a hockey stick,” according to Bart, van den Nieuwenhof’s father.

In the backyard, Vossen also trained van den Nieuwenhof on the fundamentals. According to Bart, many players are not taught to hit in today’s youth leagues but instead to push the ball with their lower body. Standing straight up to hit is uncommon now, but van den Nieuwenhof learned that from her mother, Bart said.

With Syracuse, van den Nieuwenhof has translated countless penalty corners to goals In Syracuse’s 9-1 victory over Vermont, van den Nieuwenhof finished a penalty corner on a pass from Lana Hamilton. Five minutes later, van den Nieuwenhof converted after Myrthe van Bolhius collected a rebound off a missed penalty corner for her third goal of the game.

“(Penalty corners) have been my specialty for a very long time,” van den Nieuwenhof said. “When (Ange Bradley) recruited me, she looked at someone who could take those shots. She gave me a lot of confidence coming in, that was what I was supposed to do on the team.”

At 12, van den Nieuwenhof joined ZSV Schaerweijde, a local club team. With Schaerweijde, van den Nieuwenhof led the team to a Regional Indoor Championship and a third-place finish at the Dutch National Indoor Championship.

Van den Nieuwenhof led Schaerweijde to success at The Hague, a spring tournament hosted by Dutch field hockey club Haagsche Delftsche Mixed. Van den Nieuwenhof used the penalty corners to win tournament games, said Floris Molenaar, a coach at ZSV Schaerweijde.

“I remember Eefke being one of the best players there, scoring a lot of goals both from penalty corners and field goals,” Molenaar said. “That was something that really helped us because we needed a bounce back in competition. It allowed us to win more games afterwards.”

During the club’s regular season, van den Nieuwenhof and the U16 Schaerweijde team were in a win-or-go-home situation to make the playoffs. With the game tied, Schaerweijde drew a penalty corner, which van den Nieuwenhof punched home for the game-winning goal.

Days later, in Game 2 of a best-of-three playoff series, Van den Nieuwenhof helped Schaerweijde draw level with league-rivals, Kampong, at 3-3. Schaerweijde eventually won in a shootout.

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“The way she took her team through a difficult game, to win the game was very amazing to see,” said Razwan Ahmed, the technical director at ZSV Schaerweijde.

For most of her youth career, van den Nieuwenhof played with older, more talented teams. At 15-years old, she suited up for the Schaerweijde Senior Ladies’ team, usually for women 18 and older. Van den Nieuwenhof also played on a U15 regional team in the Netherlands. She said playing up was how she learned to be physical.

“I was playing with a lot of people who were very technical,” van den Nieuwenhof said. “The tactics that were happening there were one step higher than the level I was playing with my club at home. Having the opportunity to play against really good players is what made me better.”

Playing up taught van den Nieuwenhof how to be tough. While playing for the Senior Team at Schaerweijde, van den Nieuwenhof suffered a thumb injury. Bart received a call while attending one of his other daughters’ games and left to drive van den Nieuwenhof to the hospital. Her thumb was turned “really blue” after getting hit by a ball, Bart said. The doctors said it was a contusion but her thumb was not broken. Van den Nieuwenhof told her dad to drive her back for the next game.

“The second game was already starting,” Bart said. “She jumped in and just as I drove off to go back to the other game, we heard that she scored on a penalty corner.”

At Syracuse, van den Nieuwenhof has made an impact over her first three years, leading it to back-to-back Elite Eight appearances. In 2022, van den Nieuwenhof converted a penalty in SU’s win over No. 7 Princeton in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. This year, she left her family’s vacation in Italy early to come back and train.

“She comes in everyday and provides great leadership and is one of the hardest workers at training,” Syracuse head coach Lynn Farquhar said. “What makes her incredible is she gets others to come along with her. She’s going to make sure we improve so that we continue to have multiple goal scorers and great defenders alongside her.”

Published on September 6, 2023 at 12:44 am