The Western Nebraska Community College women’s soccer team was outshot 16-7, including 8-1 in the second half, to fall 2-0 to Northwest (Wyo.) College in a Region IX Conference contest Wednesday morning at the Landers Soccer Complex.
WNCC women’s coach Todd Rasnic said it wasn’t so much that they didn’t play well; his team just couldn’t break down the Northwest defense and get shots on goal.
“If you look at the game, we possessed the game well. We had good development up until the back line of the defense of our opponent,” he said. “We just really had no success in getting our forwards into space and getting many shots off today. You can’t win games unless you can shoot the ball. “ The Cougars shot selection was limited severely by the Trapper defense in the second half. The first half was a pretty even contest as both Region IX teams hooked up in a humdinger. Northwest outshot the Cougars 8-6.
A big defining moment in the contest was the play of Cougar freshman goalkeeper Bailey Wenz. Wenz made four critical saves, but the big one came with 20 minutes into the contest when Wenz made a leaping save to thwart a Northwest goal.
Both teams kept battling with neither giving an inch. WNCC had two prime scoring chances on practically back-to-back shots with five minutes to play in the first half, but neither would go in. Northwest finally answered with a minute to play in the first half as the Trappers’ Miriam Gelderloos scored to give Northwest the 1-0 halftime lead.
WNCC came out strong in the second half as Kristi Blicharz had an excellent shot on goal to tie the contest just five minutes into the half, but Northwest goalkeeper Morgan Cox made a super save. Cox then delivered the ball to Samiha Simao, who took the ball the distance and found net just 11 seconds after Blicharz’ goal for the 2-0 lead.
Neither team scored the rest of the way as any potential threat of a Cougar scoring opportunity was extinguished by a scrappy Trapper defense.
Rasnic said Northwest really didn’t dominate play; it was just the fact that when you can’t shoot, you can’t win.
“They didn’t dominate any play, but when you are not developed well enough on the offensive side of the ball and you let a team hang around long enough in a game, they will get some goals in,” he said. “Soccer is kind of weird like that. If you don’t have someone proficient at taking on defenders and getting in space behind the defense, it is pretty tough to win games.”
Northwest not only outshot the Cougars 16-7, they also had two corner kicks to zero for the Cougars.
WNCC, 2-1, will next be in action next Wednesday when they travel to Cheyenne, Wyo., to face Laramie County Community College. Northwest moves to 4-0 on the season and will next be in action Friday when they host North Idaho College.
“We have some stuff to work on,” Rasnic said. “We will see how well we progress in this next week in training and hopefully we will come out stronger and be able to put a team on the field that can finish a game.”
Region IX Standings
Team Region IX Overall
Northwest 2-0-0 4-0-0
LCCC 1-0-0 2-1-0
W. Nebraska 0-1-0 2-1-0
W. Wyoming 0-2-0 0-2-0
Wednesday’s games
Northwest 2, WNCC 0
LCCC 8, WWCC 0
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