Women's soccer season ends in heartbreaking shootout

SILOAM SPRINGS, Ark. – By the time Wayland Baptist and John Brown got finished playing their marathon match in the Sooner Athletic Conference Tournament semifinals here Tuesday afternoon, the shadows were stretching far across Alumni Field.
 
The shadows, though, paled in comparison to the long faces of the Pioneer players, whose season came to a crushing end with a 4-3 shootout loss to the Golden Eagles following a gut-wrenching 2-2 double-overtime tie.
 
"Everybody's a little bit frustrated right now," WBU coach Shiloh Posey said. "It's never fun to lose, and unless you win it all, your season ends some time, but to come that close and work that hard…
 
"They did everything they could do to give themselves the opportunity at the end. It just didn't quite have the result we were looking for."

In a season of firsts for the WBU women's soccer program, it was only fitting that the final match came down to yet another: the first-ever shootout for the Wayland women. While this was the first extra-time match of the season for the Pioneers (13-6-1), it was the fifth for John Brown (14-3-2), which won three and tied one of its previous four overtimes.
 
After neither team scratched in 20 minutes of overtime (Wayland came the closest with a shot by Emarie Holland that banged off the cross bar and floated down into the hands of the John Brown goalkeeper), the match went to a shootout to determine which team advances to the SAC Tournament championship.
 
Right away, Wayland took the upper hand when Haley Reiser got her kick into the net and John Brown's Laura Bradshaw's effort by blocked by Pioneer goal keeper Keri Myers. The Pioneers maintained their advantage through the next two rotations, which saw Zoe Benson – who scored Wayland's equalizer first goal 10 minutes into the match – and Madison Abbott come through.

The shootout was all square after Cerila Zamarripa's shot was blocked and Julie Whitlow found the net for JBU. It all came down to the final rotation, which saw Myers step out of the goal and take the shot for the Pioneers. JBU keeper Kristen Morency was up to the challenge, though, as she blocked the shot and left the door open for John Brown.

Thanks to Rachel Harris, they stepped through it. Harris played her kick high to Myers' right, and it sailed in to allow the Golden Eagles to advance.

"It was a well-taken kick," Posey said of the deciding shot.

The Wayland coach credited Morency for her two shootout stops.

"Their goalkeeper is really, really athletic," he said, adding that Wayland scored its three shootout goals on kicks that were low and away. "The two that got blocked were more chest high, which allowed her to be able to get to them."

Despite the loss, Posey once again heaped high praise upon his players.

"I can't tell you how proud I am of all of those girls," he said. "They believed in each other and believed for each other. Not one of them didn't do everything they could do from whatever position they were in to try to will this team (to a win)."

Wayland needed lots of will after the Golden Eagles scored the first goal of the match just over five minutes in.

"We came right back and scored," Posey said of the goal by Benson off a corner kick that pinged around inside the box before the senior from Chico, Calif., booted it in for just her second goal of the season, but second in three matches.

"That gave us a lot of momentum," Posey said.

Whitlow put the Golden Eagles back on top with a goal on a free kick 15 minutes deep into the second half. Ten minutes later, it was tied again thanks to an own goal.

"We pressed and the girls did what we asked them to do," Posey said. "They got a bad touch and it bangs off one of their defenders and goes in."

Both teams then battled to the end, with Wayland coming up just a bit short.

John Brown, meanwhile, hasn't lost in its last 11 outings, a stretch that includes nine wins and a pair of ties…including Tuesday's shootout. The Golden Eagles received four votes – the equivalent of a No. 40 ranking – in the NAIA Top 25 poll released while Tuesday's match was being played.

Posey again voiced admiration for his players, who three weeks ago made the long trip home from Arkansas having suffered a 3-0 loss to John Brown.

"I don't know that wins and losses are the most important, but I do know that giving your best effort is. So just to know that we played all out, all day long means everything," he said. "No matter what location or position, they did everything they could to mandate their will to get this team to keep going, and you can't ask for more than that.

"Obviously, we would have liked to have won, but if we couldn't win I saw the very best of them today."

Posey went on to say that he hopes his team did Pioneer fans proud.

"I want to say to the people at Wayland, everybody who supported these girls all year long, we really appreciated that, and I hope we did them proud today. I really feel like the women's soccer program is on its way up, and we're looking forward already to next season and putting together another good year."

Others Receiving Votes: Thomas (Ga.) 103; Avila (Mo.) 75; Hastings (Neb.) 69; Cal State San Marcos 39; Trinity Christian (Ill.) 34; Viterbo (Wis.) 20; Reinhardt (Ga.) 17; Northwest (Wash.) 12; Westminster (Utah) 10; Oklahoma Wesleyan 10; Columbia (Mo.) 9; Grace (Ind.) 9; Northwestern Ohio 6; Trinity International (Ill.) 5; John Brown (Ark.) 4.