Less than 24 hours before the women’s soccer team was slated to play a make-up match against Tennessee-Martin (9-6, 6-2 in the Ohio Valley Conference) at Lakeside Field, the match’s location was moved to Memorial Stadium in Terre Haute, Ind.

The match was the last match of the regular season for each team and would’ve been a home match for Eastern (7-7-5, 3-3-2 OVC) however, the match became a non-home match.

With such short notice, the Panthers had to change their plans, and head coach Summer Perala addressed her team before their match against the Skyhawks.

“You can’t deal with location,” Perala said. “We just needed to focus on playing hard and trying to get a positive result.”

Perala said playing on the turf field at Memorial Stadium wasn’t a change that caused them problems, as they had previously played on turf this season.

What did cause the Panthers problems was that they couldn’t get enough good opportunities following an early scoring chance by senior forward Rachel Hamilton’s corner kick.

“Both Sam Balek and Alexis Miller got up for it, but there was miscommunication by challenging for the same ball,” Perala said. “We had a couple good combinations in the attacking third, but we weren’t ever able to get as dangerous as that opportunity.”

Eastern was only able to get one shot on goal, compared to nine from Martin. Senior goalkeeper Jenny Williams’ eight saves kept the Panthers in the match until the 81st minute.

“We had one breakdown in the back and put a hospital ball down the middle and they picked it off and hit a nice shot,” Williams said.

Perala said the goal was all on the entire team, and was frustrated that it let one get away.

“It sucks,” Perala said. “It was a chance to go into conference with a winning record overall and I don’t know if that really hit home for the younger kids but for the seniors it hurts a lot because this is their last chance to go out on a high point in the regular season.”

Williams mimicked Perala’s frustration and said nobody wants to lose, and regardless of how the goal is scored, it’s a bad feeling. However, Williams said the match might be a learning experience in which the Panthers can improve upon entering the OVC Tournament.

The 1-0 loss to the Skyhawks marked the third consecutive match in which Eastern’s offense was held scoreless – its longest drought of the season. Perala said that it’s due to the team’s lack of technical ability in the attacking third during the past few matches. Red-shirt freshman forward Ashley Streid agrees.

“We just haven’t gotten that many shots on goal the past couple games,” Streid said. “We haven’t been getting easy passes and then finishing.”

The loss put the Panthers as the No. 5 seed in the OVC Tournament, which will begin with Eastern against Tennessee Tech at 5 p.m. Thursday in Morehead, Ky.

Alex McNamee can be reached at 581-7944 or admcnamee@eiu.edu.

Senior midfielder Laura Ridolfi dribbles past Tennessee Tech freshman defender Leigh Heffner Oct. 16 at Lakeside Field. (Amir Prellberg/The Daily Eastern News)

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