Women’s soccer jumps for Joy, enters NCAC tournament for the first time

by Jesús Jiménez

The women’s soccer team made history this week and has chance to make more tomorrow after their 1-0 win over Denison University on Tuesday.  The team made the North Coast Athletic Conference tournament for the first and probably last time in history (because of the conference switch), after defeating Ohio Wesleyan University last Saturday in a nail-biting 2-1 come-from-behind victory.

The chilly Tuesday night began with a tough first half. The defense was busy, as the Big Red offense led the first half with 12 shots to Earlham’s zero.  Something about the halftime speech sparked the offense, however, as the Quakers had eight shots to Denison’s 10 in the second half. Head coach Jocelyn Keller gave her defense a lot of credit for not allowing a goal in the first half.

“At halftime, we recognized that, the fact that [junior goalkeeper] Megan Holthaus made some great saves. Franny [Newport], Allie Zeller, Ikumi [Doucette], Faye Rowell played amazingly,” explained Keller.

Earlham lost to Denison only three weeks ago, 2-0 at home. Senior co-captains, forward Callie Thompson and defender Franny Newport, had similar views on the turnaround from their previous encounter.

“We were definitely the underdog going into yesterday’s game,” said Thompson.  “However, we knew that when we played Denison earlier we hadn’t played our best game.  So we were excited to try to play them again.”

Newport echoed Thompson.“We knew we could play a lot better than how we played them last time.  The advantage we had was we didn’t play well last time.  Especially in the second half, I feel like we came out and surprised them with how we came.  We didn’t play well in the first half.  We kind of looked how we played in the first game.  That’s a big advantage we had; they didn’t know how we played and we knew how they played.”

Freshman midfielder/forward Joy Doucette added the lone goal on Tuesday with only five minutes left in the game.

“Going into the game, we knew we were the underdogs, and we just wanted to prove everyone wrong, that those stats don’t mean anything,” said Doucette. “Scoring that goal, I was just in awe, I didn’t believe what just happened. I was so happy though — that I could help our team get that far.  Defeating Denison was wonderful. We wanted to show them this time that it’s our time.”

Change of conferences

When the change of conferences was first discussed with students last semester, the soccer teams were outspokenly against the move more than other teams.  After the decision was made, the team decided to stop arguing verbally, and instead said much more with their actions on the field.

“We’ve been saying these last couple of games that everyone on our team are seniors. This is the last time that we’ll get to play in the NCAC.  This is the last time we’ll play any of these teams in conference games,” explained Newport.  “So it’s been a big goal for us to go out and compete and play well, and it really means a lot for especially us, the seniors, that we get to prove that we can compete in this conference and we can win this conference. It feels really great to go out this way.”

Thompson missed playing her junior year after suffering a torn ACL.  She has no immediate plans to come back as a player for her fifth year, but she wishes the best for the future teams.  She was also abroad when the talk of changing first initiated, but claims that she is now more content with the change after a successful season.

“Initially I was really conflicted about switching because we had always been so close,” said Thompson.  “Now this season, it was our last season, and we’ve all been saying this, we wanted to go out with a bang.  And we’ve done this already, no matter what happens on Saturday and beyond.  I think they’re gonna do well next year no matter what conference they’re in.  We’ve done the work, and we’ve proved what we wanted to prove, so I’m at peace with the change — more than I was.”

Keller also had something to say about the switch.  “You couldn’t ask for a better way to leave the conference, just having the taste in their mouths that we weren’t a lesser team,” added Keller. “Where we are we proved that we deserve to be, having beat the number one seed. I think it’s a good way to go into the HCAC because now they know what a conference tournament tastes like and they feel it.  That fire going to the HCAC will be fresh in their memory.”

Making the tournament

On Saturday, Ohio Wesleyan led 1-0 at the half, and it seemed as though the season, and NCAC career for Earlham, was over, when freshman forward Joy Doucette scored the first goal at the 70th minute to tie the contest. Thompson’s goal came late, with only seven minutes left, to put the Quakers in position to play on Tuesday.

The team also hopes to change the views that people have toward Earlham as an academic school that does not care about winning or losing.  Newport shared an anecdote from her summer.

“I hope this raises the bar for Earlham athletics. I met someone this summer who heard of Earlham and I told him I played soccer and he said, ‘Oh, Earlham is not really known for athletics,’ but I hope this puts us on the board and gets us some recognition for having good athletics and good athletes who work hard, and do well in school and just go out there and play hard every day.”

Wittenberg and Allegheny played the second semifinal match this Wednesday night. Wittenberg emerged victorious with a score of 1-0. The Quakers will travel to Wittenberg tomorrow to play the conference championship final match, starting at 6 p.m.