The Lakeland College women's soccer team lost a heartbreaker to Northern Athletics Conference foe Concordia University, Wis., 4-2, on Wednesday, Oct. 24, at Lakeland.
The Muskies (7-11, 6-5 NAC) looked to snag the win early as junior forward Amy Christenson led a vigorous offensive attack, sneaking in a goal within the first two minutes of the game on an assist from sophomore midfielder Jessica Hopfinger.
However, the Falcons rallied viciously, finding the back of the net three consecutive times to gain the 3-1 advantage at the half.
"It may have been more of a bad thing for us to score the early goal," said head coach Dave Madsen. "Usually it's never a bad thing to score early, but it seemed like we may have gotten overconfident and our energy level dropped."
Lakeland came out firing in the second half, scoring quickly once again, as junior Maggie Short knocked in a pass from freshman Hailey Wisner in the 46th minute. The Muskies continued to hunt for their third goal to tie the game, but were unable to poke one in, while the Falcons crushed all remaining hopes of a tie with their fourth goal in the 85th minute.
"We played them straight up in the second half, but by that point the damage was already done," Madsen said. "We had chances to knock one in and get the tie, but unfortunately we weren't able to make that happen. The way we played I think we should have won, but we let them have too many opportunities."
Even if Lakeland is able to win its final NAC game against Benedictine on Saturday, today's loss puts the Muskies at 6-5 in conference while Concordia improves to 7-4. Therefore, a win will only tie the Muskies with the Falcons for the sixth and final spot in the upcoming NAC Tournament, giving Concordia the advantage having defeated Lakeland.
"It's very frustrating because we knew what this game meant for us and how much we needed it," Madsen said. "In a lot of ways we have waited for things to happen too many times this year, and it finally caught up with us today."
Lakeland will close out its season at Benedictine on Saturday, Oct. 27. Game time is set for 4:30 p.m. in Lisle, Ill.
