The St. Mary’s College of Maryland field hockey team opens the 2025 NCAA Division III Championship against No. 11 Dickinson College on Wednesday, Nov. 12, at 2 p.m. at Biddle Field Complex, marking the Seahawks’ third consecutive tournament appearance.
St. Mary’s (13-5) earned an automatic bid from the United East Conference with a 1-0 double-overtime victory over Penn State Harrisburg in the league title game on Nov. 8, extending a three-game shutout streak where the team outscored foes 15-0. Dickinson (18-3) secured an at-large selection after a 4-1 loss to No. 2 Johns Hopkins in the Centennial Conference championship on Nov. 8, ending a four-game win run. The winner advances to face either Salisbury (17-2) or Denison (12-6) on Saturday at Christopher Newport University in Newport News, Va.
The teams meet for the second time overall, with Dickinson holding a 4-2 edge from a neutral-site matchup in Fredericksburg, Va., on Sept. 3, 2016. St. Mary’s enters on defensive momentum, posting 11 shutouts this season behind sophomore goalkeeper Sophia Kent’s 1.27 goals-against average. Senior captain Jena Vanskiver, the United East Defensive Player of the Year, recorded seven defensive saves to anchor the back line. Offensively, the Seahawks spread production across 14 goal scorers, led by senior forward Brenna Ziegler’s 14 goals and eight assists. Senior captain Emma Watkins added 13 goals, forming a potent front line that propelled the conference three-peat—spanning the 2023 Atlantic East and back-to-back United East titles in 2024 and 2025.
Dickinson counters with a balanced attack and home dominance, boasting an 11-0 record at Biddle Field. Megan McClure paced the Red Devils with nine goals, followed by Gillian Rosenstock’s eight and seven each from Nicole Uebele and Maggie Carson. Junior goalkeeper Taylor Morrow started all 21 games, posting a 0.92 goals-against average and eight shutouts to fuel the program’s first NCAA tournament run since 2019. The Red Devils’ comeback season included a midseason surge after early losses, positioning them as a Centennial powerhouse despite the final-game defeat.
For St. Mary’s, based in historic St. Mary’s City—the site of Maryland’s first colonial capital—the tournament bid underscores a rising program in Southern Maryland’s competitive Division III landscape. The public liberal arts college, founded in 1846 as one of the nation’s first women’s colleges, fields 19 varsity teams under the Seahawks banner, drawing from a student body of about 1,500. Field hockey, revived in 2001, has evolved into a conference contender, with the past three NCAA berths reflecting coach’s Jamey Patrick’s emphasis on disciplined play and local recruitment. Eight Seahawks earned All-United East honors this season, including first-team nods for Ziegler, Watkins, Vanskiver and Kent, highlighting depth built through regional pipelines like Maryland’s Eastern Shore and Delaware borders.
The NCAA Division III field hockey championship, contested since 1981, features 28 teams—18 conference champions and 10 at-large selections—in a single-elimination format culminating Nov. 22-23 at the University of New England in Biddeford, Maine. Selection criteria weigh winning percentage, strength of schedule and head-to-head results, with the committee announcing the bracket during a Nov. 9 show on NCAA.com. St. Mary’s path mirrors regional rivalries, as nearby Salisbury and Christopher Newport also host early rounds, amplifying Southern Maryland’s stake in the event. Fans can stream the Dickinson matchup live via NCAA.com, with tickets available through the Red Devils’ athletics site for on-site support.
The first-round clash tests St. Mary’s road resilience against Dickinson’s home edge, with weather forecasts calling for clear skies and mid-50s temperatures in Carlisle—ideal for fast circles and penalty corner executions.
As the bracket unfolds, St. Mary’s aims to extend its postseason narrative, one that traces back to the program’s 2001 inception and includes a 2012 conference crown. The Dickinson bout, under afternoon lights at Biddle Field—a venue upgraded in 2018 with synthetic turf—promises tactical chess, with both sides leaning on midfield control to feed forwards.
