Men’s Soccer
The Eastern men’s soccer team will play 12 matches at home throughout the 2023 season. This will be the Panthers’ first season playing in the Ohio Valley Conference conference, with their former being the Summit League.
The OVC for men’s soccer consists of Eastern, Lindenwood, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE), Southern Indiana, Chicago State, Houston Christian University, Liberty University, University of the Incarnate Word and Western Illinois University.
The Panthers played two home exhibition games to kick off their season, where the team tied with the Bowling Green Falcons 1-1 through two overtime periods on Friday evening and lost 4-0 to the University of Illinois Springfield Prairie Stars Monday evening at Lakeside Field.
Starting Aug. 24 the Panthers will have six consecutive non-conference matches at Lakeside Field. Their opponents are the University of Chicago, Governors State, Bradley, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, Bellarmine and Wright State.
The Panthers will travel for their last non-conference match on Sept. 19 against the University of Detroit Mercy Titans at Titan Field.
The Panthers are scheduled to play Lindenwood, SIUE, and Southern Indiana two times in the regular season; one game at home and one game away.
The Panthers are scheduled to host Liberty and Chicago State as this will be their only time facing off this season. The Panthers are traveling to play Western Illinois, University of the Incarnate Word and Houston Christian University one time this season.
The Panthers men’s soccer team finished their 2022 season with an overall record of 1-12-3 with a 0-7-1 conference record.
Women’s Soccer
The women’s soccer team is set to play 11 home matches at Lakeside Field throughout the 2023 season. With the addition of Western Illinois to the OVC, conference games will not begin until Sept. 17.
The Panthers’ schedule includes three exhibition games and five non-conference games up until their first conference game of the season against SIUE.
The Panthers shut out Parkland College with a final score of 7-0. The Panthers went on the lose the last two exhibition games. IUPUI beat EIU 1-4, and UIC beat EIU 0-1.
The Panthers started their 2023 season with a 1-2 loss against Valparaiso on Aug. 17 at Brown Field.
Northern Illinois, Indiana State, Purdue Fort Wayne, Illinois State, and Chicago State are the non-conference teams the Panthers will face for their next five games before conference games begin.
The Panthers are set to compete against every OVC team one time throughout the season: SIUE, Southeast Missouri, Morehead State, Tennessee Tech, University of Tennessee Martin, Western Illinois, Little Rock, Lindenwood, and Southern Indiana.
The Ohio Valley Conference Tournament will start on Oct. 27.
The Panthers ended last season with an overall record of 2-6-8 with a 0-4-4 conference record. The Panthers also made a change this season with a new head coach.
Dirk Bennett has been an assistant coach for EIU women’s soccer since July 2019.
Bennett was hired as the seventh head coach in program history on Feb. 10, 2023.
Zaria Flippin can be reached at 581-2812 or zhflippin@eiu.edu.
