Soccer secures top seed in tournament

Nov 5 2009 - 12:18am | Cameron Irvine

Natchitoches, La. is the site for the hopeful final six women’s soccer teams left standing in the running for the Southland Conference tournament. The winner of the competition gets a bid in the NCAA Tournament. Texas State secured its No. 1 seed with a win over Texas-El Paso Friday and a Southeastern Louisiana loss Oct. 25.

“It is always great to win and accomplish part of your dream,” said Coach Kat Conner. “(Getting) another SLC title and finally beating (Texas-San Antonio) is a good feeling.”

Texas State will play the winner of Thursday’s matchup between No. 3 seed Stephen F. Austin and No. 6 seed McNeese State Cowgirls. The Bobcats outscored these two opponents by a combined 4-1 earlier in the season, which included a hat trick from Britney Curry in the 3-1 victory over the Cowgirls. Steven F. Austin took Texas State into overtime in the teams’ previous meeting before Serena Hines, freshman forward, notched the victory with her second goal of the season and career. However, the Lumberjacks came back to finish the season well enough to clinch their 10th conference tournament berth in 13 years.

Southeastern Louisiana, as part of the projected championship matchup with Texas State, is making SLC records by appearing in its 12th tournament.

Thursday’s other wildcard matchup is between the No. 5 seed Texas-San Antonio Roadrunners and the No. 4 seed Sam Houston State Bearkats. SHSU defeated UTSA 2-0 in their game earlier this year.

“Southeastern has to get to the final and we have to get the win from our game before we can even think about that matchup,” said Conner. “The Southland has some great teams and you have seen a lot of parity in our own conference, so we will take each match one at a time. We will be ready for an orange team Friday night, whether it be Sam Houston State or UTSA.”

Coach Conner said if Texas State wins the tournament, it would most likely play at Texas A&M and face a Big 12 school. The destination and matchups will be announced Monday after the conclusion of the SLC tournament.

FYI:

All of the Southland Conference Tournament games will be broadcastlive online for free at http://www.southland.org/liveEvents/liveEvents.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=18400

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