The Cardinals came into Longwood, Virginia. looking to get back in the win column after dropping their last two games. However, the Lancers proved to be too much as they earned their first conference win of the season in a home win against Ball State 3-2.
“We just did not play our game,” head coach Caitlin Walsh said. “Literally, that is all I can say.”
With the win, Longwood snaps a seven-game losing streak as well as improve to 1-3 in conference play. Ball State, on the other hand, moves to 2-2 in conference play as well as continue their second losing streak this season, this time moving it to three games.
Early in the first quarter, the Cardinals came close to breaking the 0-0 tie but were unable to find the back of the cage. With just under 10 minutes to go in the quarter sophomore midfielder Fluer Knopert went down with an injury on a shot and was carried off the field. She sat out the rest of the quarter before returning to start the second and play the rest of the game.
After a gritty first quarter, the Cardinals and Lancers were knotted up for most of the second, that was until the penalty corner issues for Ball State started to come up and the Lancers capitalized as Chloe Underwood scored her first colligate goal of her career off of a rebound putting Longwood up 1-0.
However, the Cardinals were able to respond just 45 seconds later as midfielder Kerrianne McClay found the back of the cage on a penalty corner and tied the game at one with little time to go in the first half.
In the second half, penalty corners reared their ugly heads for the Cardinals as Ball State gave up nine penalty corners in the second half and both Longwood goals came from two of them. Ball State added on another goal in the fourth from Micheala Graney to make it a one-score game, however, the damage was done and Longwood prevailed in the end.
“I mean you’re giving a team a free shot on goal,” Walsh said. “It is poor defending, stuff we worked on this week in practice. It just did not show in the game today.”
The Cardinals (5-7, 2-2 Mid-American Conference) come home, for a conference matchup against Bellarmine (5-6, 2-2 Mid-American Conference) Oct. 15 at 1 p.m.
Contact Dane Massey with comments at dtmassey@bsu.edu or on Twitter @danemassey22.
