After a demoralizing 7-0 defeat ti Montclair State in last year’s NCAA tournament ended its season, the women’s soccer team looks to build off of its recent regular season sucess this year and improve on last year’s finish.
The team kicked off the 2014-15 campaign with a thrilling 2-1 overtime victory against Wesleyan on Saturday. The win marked the third year in a row that the Polar Bears have taken down Wesleyan during the regular season. The team will now turn its attention to its match against Amherst (1-0) tomorrow.
“In the past two years that we played Wesleyan it has been a one goal difference, so we knew it was going to be rough from the start,” said Kiersten Turner ’16. “Also, that day in particular it was 88 degrees and humid, which we just weren’t very prepared for. So to come out with the win was huge.”
The one and only Wesleyan goal came early, five minutes into the game, but the Polar Bears did not lose their composure.
“When we went down early we never gave up and always felt like we were in the game,” said Maggie Godley ’16.
While giving up the early initial goal, the team’s defense stood strong the rest of the match, controlling the game and only allowing eight shots on goal.
“Defensively they did an awesome job. They didn’t let anybody really get to Bridget other than that one goal that they scored,” said Turner.
After controlling the ball for most of the first half, the Bears finally broke through the Wesleyan defense when Amanda Kinneston ’15 put in a pass from Taylor Haist ’17. However, after scoring once on the Cardinal defense, Bowdoin could not seem to strike again despite 10 chances in the second half.
“We were knocking on the door basically from the start. We had our opportunities and it was all about having the composure and finishing it. I think that hopefully throughout the season that will improve with time and practice,” said Godley.
“Prior to the game we had only one practice with our actual team and that was on the Friday before the game. So after the game we obviously knew that we had to work on more things like finishing when it really matters in regular time so that we don’t have to go into overtime,” said Turner.
After a scoreless first overtime, Godley sent a corner kick into the box where Abby Hammerl ’17 headed in the game-winning goal.
“I thought it was good to come in and make a point in our season that we expect to do well and we expect to be strong,” said Godley.
The team will face another formidable opponent in its match tomorrow against Amherst.
“They are always very direct and they apply really high pressure. So in the middle, we need to keep it to two touches and up top we have to connect together and combine” said Turner.
The game will be at 12 p.m. at Pickard Field.