Box Score BETHANY, Okla. – Looking to sew up the Sooner Athletic Conference regular-season championship here Saturday afternoon, the Wayland Baptist men's soccer team instead came away having to play the waiting game.
"Our team is so disappointed in the result today," Wayland coach
Jamath Shoffner said after the ninth-ranked Pioneers tied with Southwestern Christian University in a Sooner Athletic Conference thriller, 2-2 in double-overtime.
Playing their regular-season finale, the Pioneers (13-2-2, 8-1-1 SAC) were 20 seconds away from claiming their first-ever conference championship when the Eagles (10-6-1, 5-4-1) scored.
Neither team notched another goal in 20 minutes of extra time.
The loss means Wayland will finish either first or second in the conference, depending on how USAO (11-4, 8-1) fares in its final regular-season match Tuesday on the road against Northwood (8-5-2, 5-2-2). If USAO ties or loses, Wayland will be the No. 1 seed in the SAC Tournament; if USAO wins, the Drovers will be the top seed.
Conference tournament matches are hosted by the higher-seeded team, so Wayland is guaranteed to host its opening match at 6 p.m. Friday, and if the Pioneers win, the semifinal on Nov. 11. Where Saturday's loss could potentially hurt Wayland is if the Pioneers face USAO in the championship match, it would be played in Chickasha, Okla., although Wayland did pull out a 2-1 overtime win there earlier this season.
"We knew what was at stake today in that we could be the regular-season champs," Shoffner said. "For the most part our guys left everything out on the field."
The Eagles scored first before Wayland tied it on an unassisted goal by
Travis Somersall, leaving the score 1-1 at halftime. It was Somersall's fifth goal of the year.
"We knew that Southwestern Christian wanted to play a defensive-minded game and we had been working on that all week," Shoffner said. "I thought we created plenty of chances to score, but were unable to finish."
The Pioneers took the lead on a header by
Samson Defeugaing, who took advantage of what Shoffner said was "an excellent cross-in with his left foot" by
Vitalis Atemafac. Defeugaing's second goal of the season put Wayland on top with approximately 15 minutes left.
The Pioneers have seen a number of late-match goals this season, and this one went against them.
"We made a mistake clearing the ball out. We cleared it to the (Southwestern Christian) goalkeeper instead of clearing it wide away from the goalkeeper, who then played it up the field, close to our box," Shoffner said. "Then, instead of one player going up for a header, three of our players did. The ball bounced at the top of the 18-yard box and their player took a bad first touch but then hit an excellent volley to score that (WBU goalkeeper) John (
John-Ramses Thomas) had no chance on."
The tie in Wayland's final regular-season match was a bookend to a season-opening 1-1 tie with then-No. 4 MidAmerica Nazarene (Kan.). The Pioneers had won five in a row and 13 of their last 14.
Statistics were not immediately available.
"We're hugely disappointed that we didn't get the result we should have, but we know we start a new season on Friday," Shoffner said. "We have to regroup and get ready for the post-season."
