he Lakeland College women's soccer team dropped its Northern Athletics Conference opener against Marian College, 2-0, on Wednesday, Sept. 12, in Fond du Lac, Wis.
The Muskies (0-5, 0-1 NAC) have gone without a goal for the past four games, but not for lack of shot attempts, as the squad tallied nine shots on goal for the game to the Sabres' four. However, most of Lakeland's attempts were collected by Marian's goalkeeper, Tiffany Erdman, who snagged eight saves.
"We were pushing hard and had some chances to score, but we just couldn't finish," said head coach Dave Madsen. "Their goalie came up with some good saves, and I think we hit the post three times. It's definitely frustrating because I felt we outplayed them for the most part. We were getting our opportunities, but we just haven't been able to finish out games so far."
The Sabres, on the other hand, did not have much difficulty finding the goal, as they found the back of the net once in each half for the shutout.
"We started out strong in the first five or ten minutes, but after that we took our foot off the pedal a little bit and Marian started to get some chances going forward," Madsen said. "Once that happened, we started to loose our confidence a little bit."
Lakeland goalkeeper senior Savannah Johnson recorded two saves in the loss, while sophomore midfielder Jessica Hopfinger led the team on the attacking end with three shots on goal in addition to five other shots. Junior forward Amy Christensen and freshman forward Maria Santelli also made attempts on goal, as Christensen recorded two shots on goal and two shot attempts while Santelli had three shots.
The Muskies will look to recover their confidence and break their goal-scoring drought with their home-opener vs. NAC opponent Concordia University Chicago on Saturday, Sept. 15.
"If we can get our finishing down, we'll be fine," Madsen said. "It's a matter of playing with urgency and intensity from the start and not relenting until we get that goal.
Game time is set for Noon at Muskie Field.
