The women’s soccer team’s season came to an end on Friday with a 3-0 loss to Miami in the semi-finals of the Mid-American Conference tournament. The loss ended a week that was full of both tragedy and sadness for a team that has been as close as a family. The death of freshman Leslie Dawley on Tuesday put the Falcons run in this year’s postseason in perspective, and made the loss on Sunday an afterthought to what has been a remarkable show of courage.
Falcons coach Andy Richards praised his team for its composure during the past week.
“I have the utmost admiration for all the girls on this team,” Richards said. “They have been absolutley magnificent, and I don’t think there are words to describe them.”
The 3-0 score in Friday’s loss was identical to the game that BG dropped to Miami in October, but Richards said the team played much better on Friday than the score indicates.
“We were a much better team this time around than when we played them last time,” Richards said. “The score really wasn’t a fair reflection of how the girls played.”
The Redhawks scored first, on a goal by Danielle Berkemeier. It was the first of three goals scored in the game by Berkemeier, who was named MAC Player of the Year for this season.The score remained 1-0 through halftime.
Richards said that had some penalty calls gone the Falcons’ way, the game could have been tied.
“Had we gotten the penalty and it been a 1-1 game, I think we’d have had a pretty good chance to win it,” Richards said. “But it didn’t go our way.”
BG fell behind 2-0 in the second half, and with five minutes left to play, surrendered another goal to put the game out of reach. Miami not only won the game, but defeated Ohio 5-1 on Sunday to become MAC postseason champions for the third consecutive season.
The Falcons finished the season with a record of 12-8-2, a five win improvement from last season. In addition, several Falcons were given MAC honors the night before the game.
Team captain and goalkeeper Erika Flanders, and sophomore Kristy Coppes each were named to the MAC All-Tournament team.
Flanders made eight saves in Friday’s game. Coppes scored the first goal of Wednesday’s win against Buffalo. In addition, Flanders was named to the All-MAC first team, only the second player in the program’s history to receive the honor. Tracy Gleixner earned the honor in 1998.
Samantha Meister was named MAC Rookie of the year, the second straight year a BG player has won the honor. Coppes won the award last year. Meister’s award is especially impressive considering that she missed 12 games this season with a broken nose.
Richards said that a BG player winning the rookie of the year award in two consecutive years says a lot about the quality of the program.
“It’s nice for the program to win the award two years in a row,” Richards said. “It shows the quality of kids we are bringing in.”
Richards said that the the awards also show that the future is bright for the program. The majority of the team’s players are just finishing their first or second seasons.
“This is a great team that is going to be here next year,” Richards said.
The team will also lose four seniors, as Erika Flanders, Tracy Gleixner, Jill Conover and Susan Wallace have all now played their final BG game. Richards gave credit to the seniors for holding the team together during the past week.
