The women’s soccer team played Nazareth College to a 0–0 overtime tie on Saturday. The tie gives the Bombers the second overall seed in this year’s Empire 8 conference tournament, which will be hosted by Nazareth on Saturday Nov. 6th and Sunday Nov. 7th.
The Blue and Gold came out looking to score early, but shots by freshman forward Ellen Grant-Keane and junior midfielder Megan Trager were saved by Golden Flyers senior goalkeeper Hillary Simon to keep the Bombers off the scoreboard.
Senior goalkeeper Jessica Platt said the team played well but just couldn’t get the goal they needed.
“I think we played great,” Platt said. “Our defense was awesome; I don’t think I saw a real shot all game. Our offense was having lots of great opportunities but couldn’t quite move the {goalkeeper} in the goal there.”
Head Coach Mindy Quigg said the defense played a large part in limiting the Golden Flyers while the Bombers were able to pummel the opposing net.
“We played really well,” Quigg said. “We just didn’t take advantage of our opportunities to score. We created a ton of chances; really good looks at the goal, their keeper came up big several times, but we also didn’t finish the job. We didn’t really give up any good scoring opportunities.”
The Blue and Gold dominated possession throughout the game building a 27–12 shot advantage. Trager and Grant–Keane led the team in shots with eight and six, respectively, while sophomore leading-scorer Rachael Palladino had four.
Although Palladino said the team played very good all game, she said the team’s shooting could have been better.
“We played really well,” Palladino said. “We pressured them the entire time and we created lots of opportunities for ourselves; we just couldn’t finish it. We did everything that we could have we just need to put the ball in the net.
The Bombers have two games remaining before the start of the Empire 8 tournament. The first will be against SUNY–Oneonta at 3:30 on Tuesday October 26th and the regular season finale will come on Saturday October 30th at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Quigg said she was satisfied with the way the team played and that the team needs to focus in order to win closer games.
“We’re on a roll,” Quigg said. “We’re still playing well. We just have to keep our task going forward. We have to have a bit more composure in front of the net. We have to keep on doing what we’ve been doing and figure out a way to scoring in those games where we’re frustrated.”
