Box Score He's no stock broker, but after a 1-0 loss to Ohio Dominican on Wednesday night (Oct. 3), at Ferguson Field, AU head women's soccer coach Glenn Francis talked about short- and long-term gains.
The Eagles fell to ODU, 1-0 on Wednesday. Although these are two GLIAC schools, this was not a conference game. That's not the only strange twist to this affair. Even though the Eagles lost, Francis was adamant that there was a great deal of positives to be pulled from this effort.
"After the goal, our heads didn't go down," observed Francis. "Tonight's game was all about playing for each other. That's what we've preached from Day 1. Now they are buying in."
AU is 2-9-0. The win upped the Panthers' record to 5-4-2.
In the first half, ODU ran up a 9-1 edge in shots. The only goal of the evening came at 38:04 when Lauren Pratt beat keeper Rebecca Plescia (Parma, Ohio/Padua). Summer Bourcier picked up the assist on the play.
"It was bad clearance, we shot ourselves in the foot," said Francis of the goal. "We aren't scoring, we can't afford to spot them one."
This was AU's third consecutive game without a goal and it was also the third straight loss. In the last two games against Saginaw Valley State and Northwood, the Eagles weren't able to mount that many legitimate scoring opportunities. That wasn't the case against ODU.
AU was able to apply pressure throughout the second half. Over the last 45 minutes Ashland held a 6-5 edge in shots and several times, the Eagles got good clean looks at the goal. Ohio Dominican keeper Laura Clark had four saves.
"We stuck to the task at hand," said Francis. We kept on pressing."
Ashland returns to conference action on Friday (Oct. 5, 5 p.m.) when it hosts Malone
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