NEW BRITAIN, Conn. – The Fairleigh Dickinson women's soccer team rallied from behind in a tightly contested Northeast Conference semifinal, but Central Connecticut State scoring the winning goal to win, 2-1, and advance to Sunday's championship game.
Trailing 1-0 in the second half, the Knights (6-10-3, 4-3-1 NEC) played aggressively on the attack, and junior
Jackson Bennett provided the tying goal off a feed from freshman
Madelyn Robbins, her second goal of the season.
CCSU, however, benefited from a goal with less than 10 minutes remaining and held the Knights without a scoring chance the rest of the way. The season ends for the Knights having reached the NEC Tournament for the sixth straight season but not able to secure a second NEC title trophy.
"I'm really proud of how hard they played," head coach
Eric Teepe said after the match. "It's never fun when the season ends. I think as a team, we probably wish we had the first half back because we played too tentative. Unfortunately, it's been our season where we have the ball and aren't creating enough dangerous chances. I thought we did more than enough to win in the second half. We had the chances, we just didn't put the ball in the net."
A defensive struggle dominated the first half. The Knights gained good control of possession in the early minutes of the contest, but CCSU managed the only shot through the first 15 minutes of play.
The Blue Devils (15-1-2, 8-0 NEC) challenged Fitzgerald with their first shot on goal in the 19th minute, but the junior was right in front to make the stop on the line drive shot. She also saved another close chance a few minutes later, keep the score at 0-0 through the first 25 minutes.
The FDU backfield of senior
Julia Shea, first-team All-NEC junior
Samantha Roff, freshman
Paula Ruess and All-NEC rookie teamer
Noam Kedem played strong as a unit in the first half in front of Fitzgerald, keeping CCSU off the scoreboard in the first half.
"We knew that with the wind coming at us, they were probably going to come out pretty fast," Teepe continued. "We tried to slow the game down a little. I think we did too much of slowing it down, but at least we changed that at halftime."
The second half started with two more saves by Fitzgerald in the first five minutes of the period. Freshman
Lea Egner then fired the Knights' first scoring chance in the 52nd minute from long distance, with the CCSU goalkeeper making the save.
The Knights continued to press on the attack, with freshman
Madelyn Robbins taking their best opportunity with a close shot in the box that was saved.
CCSU, however, countered with a play into the box that led to a goal in the 55th minute, making it 1-0.
Pressing to equalize, the Knights gained two corner kick opportunites shortly after the goal. The second try led to a scramble in the box, with sophomores
Sofia Albertsson and
Viktorija Miseljic fighting to poke the ball into the net. The CCSU keeper, however, corralled the ball to end the chance.
The attacking pressure paid off for the Knights in the 69th minute. Robbins gained control of the ball on FDU's half of the field and dribbled halfway down before playing a ball into the box to Bennett, who nicely placed her shot between the goalkeeper and the near post to tie the match at 1-1.
Both teams tried a chance to score the go-ahead goal after FDU's score, with Albertsson taking the Knights' chance in the 78th minute. It was CCSU, however, that gained the go-ahead goal with 9:14 remaining off a cross into the box.
Searching for an opportunity to tie again, a free kick from Egner was knocked away by the CCSU defense in the closing minutes, as the Blue Devils held on to their lead.
"At the end of the day, you have to put the ball in the back of the net, and that's something we struggled to do," Teepe said. "I felt we had a team that could win it all, but it's unfortunate that the season had to end early."
Robbins, who was named to the All-NEC rookie team yesterday, recorded her fourth assist of the season on Bennett's goal, tying her for the team lead with Egner and senior
Elma Kolenovic, who played in her final game as a Knight.
Fitzgerald finished the match with five saves, upping her career total to 298, which will be the third most among active NCAA Division I players when she begins her senior season next year.
Miseljic ends the season as the Knights' leading scorer, tallying six goals and 14 points on the season. Albertsson finished second on the team with four goals and three assists for 11 points.
CCSU advances to Sunday's championship match and will face the winner of the Saint Francis U-Mount St. Mary's semfinal matchup.
