MARSHALL — The Southwest Minnesota State University football team was unable to take advantage of a strong offensive start against Minot State University in Sunday afternoon’s Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference game. Even though the Mustangs’ offense in the first half was strong throughout the season, they were unable to take advantage of it and lost 1-0 to the Beavers.
“We always believed this team could do good things. There was never a day when we doubted what we could do offensively, but this game, we did it.” It’s just that I put together at least half of it.” SMSU head coach Clay Glasgow said.
At halftime, SMSU held a 6-3 advantage in shots on goal. Serena Prolich led the team with two shots on goal, and Der Kloten, Haley Mason, Brooke Wetterstrom and Jada Backes each added one. Mason finished the game with a total of three shots, including two one-on-one shots with the goalie, but none were converted.
“We had some chances and we didn’t miss them.” Mr. Glasgow said. “Any team in our conference, you have to score every chance you get because this is a tough conference…It’s 1-0, we played the top teams on Friday (4th place UMary, 2-0) 1-1 NSIC)” …and the game ended in a 0-0 draw. Every point is important. However, I finally felt like we were in good shape offensively in this game. we put it together. ”
Despite the Mustangs’ offensive dominance in the first half, they entered the locker room trailing 1-0. Manuela Pacheco’s shot into the bottom left corner of the goal was saved by SMSU goalkeeper Rachel Hicks, but Mia Ruiz recovered and passed the ball to Anna Miotto, who took the lead with a header in the 37th minute. Miott made eight of the Beavers’ 18 shot attempts.
“In soccer, a lot of things are uncertain. You never know. You can have 90% possession and still lose the game in the end.” Mr. Glasgow said. “I’m going to look at the tape again to see who didn’t contest it. She shouldn’t have taken an uncontested header into the box. To be fair, how many of our goalkeepers did that before that?” He made some good saves, so we just have to do a better job of clearing the ball.”
In Friday’s tie against UMary, Hicks made 10 saves and earned his first clean sheet of the season. She made eight more saves against Minot State on Sunday, but a lack of production offensively cost the Mustangs the loss.
SMSU finished the first half with six shots on target, but held out in the second half without any shot attempts. Minot, on the other hand, turned things around even more after the break with five shots on goal.
“We had some momentum in the game, but I felt like we lost a little bit of momentum.” Mr. Glasgow spoke about this change. “Listening to them, I felt like they were a team that played with a lot of emotion and we were caught up in that emotion, but we just weren’t playing as well as we should have. It just wasn’t there.”
Glasgow added that there were moments when the team returned to its original identity and played the way it wanted, but felt it could not sustain itself long enough to take advantage of it.
Siliana Gudino kept a clean sheet for Minot, saving all six shots she faced.
Sunday’s loss leaves SMSU at 0-6-1 overall on the season and 0-2-1 in the NSIC, which puts them in 14th place. The Mustangs will play this week against Minnesota Crookston (1-5-1, 1-2 NSIC) on Friday at 3 p.m. and Bemidji State (4-5-1 NSIC) at 1 p.m. They will try to turn their luck around by going on the road for a game in which they lost, 1 win and 2 losses (NSIC). 3, 2-1 NSIC) Sunday.
“It was a tough game, but we have 11 games left. We’ve got to regroup, watch tape, practice, come back and keep working. That’s all you can do.” Mr. Glasgow said. “It’s not the defense, it’s not the goalkeeper’s fault, it’s not the midfielders’ fault, it’s just that we didn’t score. Sometimes we win as a team, sometimes we lose as a team. You just have to keep working and keep moving forward.”