After an exciting 2013 campaign, the seventh-seeded women’s soccer team saw its season come to an end on Saturday, Nov. 2 after it lost 3-1 to second-seeded Williams in the NESCAC playoffs. Isabel Clements ’16 scored the Cardinals’ lone goal in the loss, while goalkeeper Jessica Tollman ’15 made four saves in net.
This was the second straight year that the Cardinals have been eliminated from the playoffs by Williams, their Little Three rival. When the two teams met earlier this season, the Ephs won a tight matchup 1-0 in overtime. Coming into the game on Saturday with a four-game undefeated streak, Wesleyan was looking to ride its momentum to an upset.
“We came in as an underdog,” said Cardinal goalie Rachel Hobert ’16. “We definitely believed in ourselves. That was a big key going in, especially after beating Middlebury last year as the eighth seed.”
Unfortunately for the Cardinals, the Ephs began Saturday firing on all cylinders, scoring two goals in the first four minutes of play. The first goal came on a shot from the left side of the box, just over Tollman and into the upper-right side of the net, while the second goal came from short range off of a blocked attempt moments earlier.
“What we really needed to do, which we weren’t able to follow through on, was take the heat out of the game for the first 10 to 15 minutes,” Hobert said. “Good teams like Williams come out hard at the very beginning, and even though we’ve been successful this season at neutralizing teams like that, we weren’t able to on Saturday.”
After the Ephs’ second goal, the Wesleyan defense stepped up tremendously, allowing no corner kicks and only two more shots in the rest of the first half. Hobert described the Cardinals’ resiliency, explaining that they had been facing struggles similar to those in the first half of Saturday’s game all year long. Just last Wednesday, the team fell behind 2-0 to Conn. College before storming back in the second half to finish with a draw.
“The great thing about this season was that our bench was very positive,” Hobert said. “[Our bench] was referred to a lot as our ‘twelfth player on the field,’ getting the team going. After those first two goals, it was surprisingly enough a positive feeling on the bench, knowing that we had done this before.”
Wesleyan was able to cut into the Williams lead in the second half when Clements scored her first goal of the year in the 75th minute. After a struggle for the ball in front of the net, Clements was able to fire a shot past the Williams goalkeeper.
The teams stayed separated by just one goal until the 88th minute of play, when the Ephs finally put the game away with their third goal of the day. Both teams ended the game with three corner kicks, and both goalkeepers finished with four saves apiece. Williams ended with a 17-11 advantage in shots taken in the contest.
Wesleyan finished its season with a 2-7-6 record overall and with a 1-5-5 record in NESCAC play. After starting the year slowly, Wesleyan picked up the pace during the season’s final stretch. Hobert was particularly impressed with the team’s ability to peak at the right moment this year.
“We weren’t getting the results we wanted [in the beginning], especially because we were such a talented team,” Hobert said. “We noticed that once we didn’t quite have the pressure on us, that talent started to show.”
Hobert also noted just how well the team came together as a unit and that everyone stepped up when called on. In a season filled with various injuries, many defensive and midfield players ended up converting to attacking positions where they hadn’t played before.
“We saw towards the end of the year that we were being a lot more supportive as a team,” Hobert said. “We saw that it was less focused on the individual problems and more as a team problem. We faced it and accepted responsibilities, and we knew when it was time to get our act together. If I were to describe our team with a couple of words, I would use ‘heart’ and ‘belief.’”