Junior Cindy Benitez fights for a ball against a Truman State defender on Saturday. The Tigers lost to the Bulldogs 0-1. The Tigers also played Southwest Baptist University on Tuesday and lost 1-3.
The Fort Hays State University women’s soccer team started October with another loss. Saturday afternoon, the Tigers played the Truman State University Bulldogs of Missouri, which ended in a 0-1 loss to the conference foe.
Going into the game, the Tigers and Bulldogs had similar records of 3-4-1 and 3-4-2, respectively. Truman took 12 shots, while Fort Hays took only one. Sophomore Joanne Glynn went after the goal at 9:36, but the shot was wide and right.
The Tigers were occupied with defending to have more attempts for the rest of the game. 14 fouls were called on Fort Hays, and 16 were called on Truman.
Freshman goalkeeper Kelsey Grey earned three saves in Saturday’s game with two saves being only three minutes apart.
Fort Hays then played against Southwest Baptist University Bearcats on Tuesday afternoon. The game started off with a goal from the Bearcats almost 12 minutes into the game, the ball rolled into the net of the Tigers, when a Bearcat hadn’t even kicked the ball. A Hays defender had a misplay that caused the goal to roll into the Fort Hays goal to give the Bearcats the point.
“Partly wind, and mostly miscommunication between the defender and the goalkeeper. The goalkeeper came out to defend it,” head coach Craig Shaw said about what contributed to the goal.
“It (the wind) was a huge issue. It was so bad. We’re lucky this is the only game it’s happened to. They played in the wind, too, so we can’t blame that,” Shaw said when asked if the wind was a factor in the game.
Six minutes after the first goal, Glynn kicked the ball to score a real goal in the Bearcat’s net. Her assist came off a pass from freshman Hailey Davey.
“At the time, it was huge. It was a big relief. I thought we might hold them off,” Shaw said of Glynn’s goal.
The game remained tied until the 39th minute, when Southwest Baptist added two more goals to their score to make the score 3-1 in favor of the Bearcats.
“The second goal and third goal, we dug ourselves a hole and we just couldn’t get out of it. We gave three goals in the first half, and it can be very, very hard to come out,” Shaw said. “It’s just little defensive mistakes that we made ourselves.”
Only five of the thirteen shots Fort Hays attempted needed saved by the Bearcats.
“We didn’t have that many chances. We just have to create more. They did a great job defending the second half, so they stopped us from creating good chances,” Shaw said.
The Tigers took yet another loss in a conference game, making their MIAA record fall to 0-3.
“The Truman game was great. I thought we played really well against Truman. They have won nine out of the last 12 conference titles. They went to Nationals last year. We played brilliant against them,” Shaw said. “That’s why it’s upsetting that we played so well against Truman and then coming out and playing so bad against an inferior opposition.”
The final score against Southwest Baptist University was 1-3 in favor of the Bearcats.
On Thursday, the Fort Hays Tigers will travel to Emporia to play the Hornets again, hoping for a win rather than a tie this time.
The Tigers will also be looking for their first ever conference win in the history of the newly established program.
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