Bearcat soccer meets struggling Emporia, Washburn

Currently situated in fourth place in the MIAA, the Northwest Missouri State women's soccer team has a great chance to gain ground on the teams ahead of them this weekend with a 4 p.m. road match today against Emporia State and a 1 p.m. home match Sunday with Washburn.

Both slotted in the bottom five of the conference, Emporia and Washburn have a combined record of 5-14-1.

The Hornets (3-6-1, 0-4-1) are one of just two teams remaining in the MIAA without a conference win.

Washburn beat Nebraska-Kearney last weekend, but is only 2-8 overall.

"We got to get points," said Northwest Missouri State head coach Tracy Hoza. "The race is very close with all the teams and everybody want to be in the four to host a playoff or be in the top eight to be in the playoffs."

Northwest strengthened its hopes for a top four finish last weekend, beating Northeastern State 3-0 and drawing with conference co-leader Central Oklahoma 1-1.

These results followed a stunning 3-1 loss to NAIA Graceland on Tuesday.

"We bounced back the way we should've," said Hoza. "We played the way we should've been playing from the beginning of he season because I knew we were missing something. It was that collective work together in attacking and defending and it came back even stronger and better on Friday and Sunday."

Northwest let in only one goal in the two matches despite giving up 40 shot attempts.

The shutout of Northeastern was Northwest's second in the last two weeks.

Goalkeeper Kelsey Adams made a combined 16 saves in both matches and leads the MIAA with 68 on the season.

"We're not content to give up shots, but what we'll do is put them under pressure to where they won't get a good shot on goal or a pass into the goal," said Hoza. "We put them under pressure, so they'll shank it wide or won't get it on target. That's the most important thing. Our goal will be to stop them taking shots on us."

Offensively, Northwest comes into the weekend ranked third in shot attempts (179) and second in goals scored (25).

New Northwest career scoring leader Tori Von Mende ranks third in the conference in goals (7) and goals per game (.70). Amanda Bundrant is in the top 10 in assists, averaging .30 per game.

Bundrant scored the game-tying goal against Central Oklahoma with three minutes left in regulation.