Women's Soccer Faces Pivotal Weekend
Release Date: October 14, 2001
It will be a make-or-break weekend for the Monmouth
College Fighting Scots women’s soccer team when they play host to Midwest Conference
foes St. Norbert College and Lawrence University Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 16-17, at
Bobby Woll Memorial Field.
The men’s team will also be in action against those
schools on the same field. Saturday’s women match vs. St. Norbert is at 1 p.m., with the
men to follow at 3 p.m. On Sunday, play begins at 11 a.m. with the Scot women taking on
Lawrence, and the men’s match follows at 1 p.m.
Although the men’s team has been eliminated from
qualifying for the postseason MWC tournament, the women are still very much in the hunt
for their first-ever berth. They need to sweep the weekend to stay that way, however.
Coach Simon Cordery’s team enters the pivotal homestand
with a 2-3 league mark (2-8-1 overall). St. Norbert and Lawrence stand at 4-2 and 3-2-1,
respectively, good for fourth and sixth place in the league.
A weekend sweep would improve the Scots to 4-3, and the
women’s final two league matches are winnable contests against Knox and Illinois College
squads that have one combined league victory.
As their records indicate, St. Norbert and Lawrence are
fairly even in terms of talent, a fact proved Wednesday when they met at Lawrence. The
visiting Green Knights pulled out a 1-0 victory in overtime, with Katie Konat (No. 9)
netting the game-winner in the sixth minute of the extra session.
SNC goalkeeper Meghan O’Donnell recorded her fourth
league shutout of the year and has allowed just three goals in six league matches.
Lawrence ’keeper Kim Geiser, last year’s first-team All-MWC selection, has been slightly
more vulnerable, with six goals allowed.
The Vikings, however, have a more potent attack, and
they feature the No. 2 scorer in the conference in Megan Tiemann (No. 17), who has nine
goals and six assists (24 points). Tiemann was the Co-Player of the Year in the
conference as a freshman last season. Betsy Moyer (No. 12) and Beth Mollner (No. 14) are
also in the top 10 in scoring. Tiemann and Geiser have both earned MWC Player of the
Week honors this year, and Gina Casati (No. 3) is also a player to watch.
St. Norbert is led in the scoring department by Nadia
Musallam (No. 11). Musallam and Konat have both earned MWC Player of the Week honors for
their offensive exploits this season.
The Scots have been led by their second and third
all-time leading scorers, senior Jill Heneghan (No. 5) and junior Jessica Adams (No. 7).
Heneghan has found the back of the net five times this fall, while Adams has four goals,
three of them coming in a loss to Millikin University as she produced her third career
hat trick.
Senior Colleen Shaughnessy has been solid in goal for
Monmouth, earning MWC Defensive Player of the Week honors for her performance in the
Scots’ back-to-back victories on a Wisconsin road swing in September.
On that trip, the Scots defeated Carroll, which is tied
with St. Norbert for fourth in the MWC at 4-2. The top four teams qualify for the
postseason, so having the head-to-head tiebreaker against Carroll, the defending league
champion, could come into play.
Grinnell and the two teams that topped Monmouth last
weekend, Beloit and Lake Forest, are the other teams ahead of the Scots.
On the men’s side, coach Rue Carthew’s team has played
some tight defensive matches in the league but can’t get the big goal when they need
one. The team is 2-6 overall and 1-5 in the MWC.
The Scots beat Illinois College 2-1 to start their
league schedule, but then dropped three straight one-goal setbacks before falling by a
combined 7-1 to Beloit and Lake Forest last weekend.
Matt Burge (No. 4) and Zach Hampson (No. 17) are the
team’s leading scorers with two goals apiece.
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