Local Sports

Wildcat women want more soccer success on the road

MARQUETTE -- The women's soccer team at Northern Michigan University is trying to climb back into the thick of the conference race in a most difficult way -- playing a number of matches on the road.

The Wildcats are 4-3-1 overall but only 1-3 in the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference after taking on two of the preseason's top picks to win the league.

Now NMU travels downstate to Detroit to take on Wayne State at 1 p.m. today and then a bit back north to University Center between Saginaw and Bay City to face Saginaw Valley State at 1 p.m. Sunday.

While Northern is mired in eighth place in the 10-team GLIAC, Wayne State is fourth at 2-0-1 in league and 6-0-1 overall, while the SVSU encounter will already be the teams' second meeting as the Cardinals are 3-1 in conference and 5-3 overall.

This weekend's matches are just two of five consecutive games being played away from home for the Wildcats, who finish the trip with their first of two Upper Peninsula rivalry games vs. Michigan Tech -- in Houghton -- at noon on Sunday, Oct. 4.

Northern finally gets to return home to the NMU Soccer Field at 3 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 9, for a game vs. Purdue Northwest. That will begin a five-game homestand that takes the Wildcats to within a few days of the end of the regular season.

But their first order of business is taking on two quality opponents at their Lower Peninsula fields.

Fans can stream both matches online through FloCollege, follow along with live statistics by looking under the women's soccer schedule on nmuwildcats.com, and subscribe to the official NMU women's soccer social media channels for match-day updates.

The current road odyssey began last weekend when the Wildcats split a pair of matches. They lost at Roosevelt 2-1 last Friday, but just before the end of that game broke their nearly 270-minute-long scoring drought in the GLIAC.

Previously shut out by national No. 5 Grand Valley State and then No. 2 preseason SVSU, Northern broke through in the scoring column in the final two minutes vs. Roosevelt.

That might've provided enough momentum to push the Wildcats to their first league win, 3-0 at Wisconsin-Parkside on Sunday.

In the game vs. Roosevelt, NMU pumped 20 shots toward the Lakers' net only to be thwarted until the final minutes when Northern's Gretchen Ellis scored her first goal of the season.

Two days later in Wisconsin, Wildcats' senior captain Madison Bilbia notched her first two goals of the fall less than 25 minutes apart, while freshman teammate Lily Senese added an insurance marker with not quite 10 minutes left in the first half for an early advantage.

In goal, Northern redshirt freshman Carly Sides had to stop just one shot on goal for the shutout even as the Rangers took 14 total shots.

Oddly enough, Parkside would've been a more likely candidate to shut down the Wildcats as the Rangers entered their game on a four-game shutout streak.

Northern head coach Erin Egolf said in an NMU Sports Information news release previewing this weekend that a key to finding sustained success is improving consistency.

"I think soccer is a unique sport in that sometimes you play well and lose, and sometimes you don't play well and win," she said. "I think for us, we're still trying to find a lot of consistency, and (last) weekend was a perfect example of it.

"We saw two different teams in ourselves. Friday, I think that while we had a really nice first half, we were in command, full control, we walked off the field at halftime with nothing to show for it; that's super disappointing. And then, we give a team that shouldn't realistically be in the game with you, (some) belief, and then we all know what happened in the second half.

"And then you turn around and you play one of your biggest competitors, best competition that you've seen all season on Sunday, and we were fantastic."

After opening the season 3-0-1 in nonconference games, the Wildcats moved into the top 25, in 22nd place, in national rankings conducted by United Soccer Coaches.

Egolf is insistent that peaking at the right point in the season and earning a spot in the NCAA tournament should be the team's ultimate goal. Getting there all but requires a top-eight position in the Midwest Region by season's end.

"We talk about that a lot, and just keeping expectations and standards high," she said. "And we celebrate the good things; obviously there's a lot to be happy about when you're ranked 22nd in the nation, but again, in Week 1 or Week 2 or Week 6, that's not reality.

"We are trying to peak at the end of the season and build toward that. There's always going to be a little bit of, 'Hey, we're undefeated, we're 3-0-1, we've made it,' but I think our team does a good job of understanding (reality)."

Story contents based on a Northern Michigan University Sports Information press release previewing the games. Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee's email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.