Football

women’s soccer dethrones royals

Men Hold Off NYU The Muhlenberg men’s soccer team made a late first-half goal stand up and defeated New York University, 1-0, in a matchup of two teams that received bids to the NCAA Tournament last year. With 1:58 left in the opening period, sophomore Mike Williams drilled a shot into the top left corner of the goal off a feed from senior Steven Tenenzapf off a corner kick. That was the end of the scoring, but not the end of the story. Five minutes into the second half, the Violets (0-2) hit the right post on a bending shot. Midway through the half, the Mules (2-1) were awarded a penalty kick, but the shot was saved. Just 59 seconds later, Muhlenberg was stopped again on a penalty kick. With under seven minutes remaining, an NYU header hit the crossbar. The Violets had one last attempt to tie in the last two minutes, but Joseph Gogel made one of his three saves to preserve the shutout win. Click here for box score.

Since the start of the program in 1991, the Muhlenberg women’s soccer team had never defeated Scranton.

Until now.

The Mules can get rid of that goose egg (0-10-2). Game No. 13 proved to be the lucky one - they defeated the Royals 3-1 at Varsity Field.

“We knew this was the year we were going to beat them,” said

Junior Kimberly Hacker uses her head to win a ball in the first half. Photo courtesy StopTheAction.com.

freshman Jamie Weiss, who scored the first goal of her Muhlenberg career. “We talked about it in the huddle before the game. We were all pumped up.”

“This year everyone had a strong desire to win,” said junior Samantha Hoffman. “And everyone got it done.”

Although the Mules (4-0) dominated the ball for most of the opening half, Scranton (1-3) scored first, 26:48 into the game.

It looked like Muhlenberg would be down a goal at halftime until junior Kasey Hacker hit a shot from 15 yards out into the lower left corner to tie it up with less than five minutes to play. Weiss followed with a short goal from the right side of the field with 34 seconds left and put the Mules on top, 2-1.

“It was exciting to have my first goal be the go-ahead,” Weiss said. “But the goal came from a lot of hard work from my teammates.”

Muhlenberg came into the second half with the mindset it had to dominate the field again. Last season the Mules had trouble keeping the lead in a few of their games, including what could have been their first win against Scranton.

“We have that experience from last year, knowing that it can happen, and we’re very conscious of it,” said Hacker. “So this year we purposely push hard through the last 15 minutes of each half.”

And the surge worked. Freshman Nicolette Miller scored off a cross from freshman Renee Dessimone with 11:11 left in the game to ensure a Mule victory.

September 7, 2008 not only marks the day when the Mules finally dethroned the Royals, but it also marks a special day for junior Jayne Condon.

“It was Jayne’s birthday, so we had to put up a W,” said Hoffman. “A 21st birthday is a reason to celebrate.”

So is the first 4-0 start in program history.
Click here for box score.