Only five have been there.

On the women’s soccer team’s roster of 24 players, only five played on the 2000 playoff team that went all the way to the championship game of the Mid-American Conference tournament.

Senior goalkeeper Erika Flanders is excited to get back to the playoffs after a year’s absence.

“It’s exciting,” Flanders said. “It’ll be good to show the younger classmen what it is like to be there.”

The majority of the roster is made up of players who joined the team after the 2000 season. After last season’s 7-10-1 record, which was not good enough for a postseason berth, Falcons’ coach Andy Richards set a goal for the team of getting back to the playoffs. Richards has said this season that the team has progressed better than he expected. With one non-conference game to play, the Falcons have a record of 10-7-2. Not only have the Falcons reached the postseason, they will be ranked third or fourth in the tournament, and for the first time in the program’s history will host a postseason game.

Despite a lack of postseason experience, several of the upper classmen said they are confident that the young players will respond well to playoff pressure.

“It’s just another game, they know how to play soccer already,” Kasey Freeman said. “They will just keep playing like they have been all year.”

Carrie Richards, a junior who joined the team last season, said that the team’s leadership from the upperclassmen will be a big help to the younger players.

“They are all great leaders who know how to play soccer,” she said. “All we can do is pump them up and get ready for the game.”

Flanders said she has been talking to the players about what to expect in the postseason.

“I have told them stories about what a great time and what a fun experience it was,” Flanders said. “That’s pretty much all I can tell them until they get there.”

Coach Richards said that while most of the team is inexperienced, the naiveté of some of the younger players could work as an advantage. When comparing the two playoff teams, Richards said the 2000 team was a more experienced team, while this season’s team has more depth.

“It’s very hard to compare teams, because every team is different,” he said. “This year’s team has a lot more naiveté, which in many ways is good, because you won’t get overwhelmed by situations.”

The team’s final MAC game of the year was a 3-2 loss to Northern Illinois, a game where BG led 2-0 until late in the game. Had the Falcons won the game, they would have won five in a row. Richards said that the loss may have some positive effects on this year’s postseason run.

“It’d be very easy to get frustrated and irritated after losing a game like that,” he said. “But maybe that was just the wake up call we needed. We had to learn that the job isn’t done until the final whistle blows.”

The Falcons will have one more game before the postseason starts, tomorrow, on the road against Wright State. Their quest for the MAC title begins on Tuesday at Cochrane Field at 2 p.m. The Falcons will have to wait until tomorrow to see who their opponent will be. Freeman said that the opponent doesn’t matter.

“Any of the teams that we have to go against we can beat,” Freeman said. “All the teams are pretty much equal and we can go against any of them.”

Flanders said a few weeks ago that she felt the team had a strong chance to win the MAC postseason and go to the NCAA tournament. Now, just a few days from the playoffs, she said she is not backing down from that belief.

“We’re a strong team,” Flanders said. “We will come out and play that way.”

While the coach, no doubt, shares the confidence of his goalkeeper, he also wants the team to just worry about one game at a time.

“You can’t win the MAC until you win the first game on Tuesday,” he said. “We can’t get carried away and start worrying about the next game until we win that one.”

Richards said that it is important to get a big crowd for Tuesday’s playoff game.

“We really would like to have some support for the game,” Richards said. “If we can get a big crowd urging us on to victory, that’s really going to help us.”