The Spring Arbor University women's soccer team made a second long trek down to Marion, Indiana to take on the Wildcats of Indiana Wesleyan University on Thursday.  The first meeting between the two teams was rained out last week.

In spite of dominating the play and the scoresheet, SAU fell 1-0 in the final regular season CL match of the fall.

SAU applied pressure to the IWU defense and goalkeeper Jamie Speidel through out the match, but were not able to capitalize on the numerous opportunities that they created.

The Cougars outshot IWU 13-3 in the opening frame, including a pair of shots of the crossbar and several of sparkling saves by Speidel.  It was the Wildcats who got the bounce that they were looking for, however, when a misplayed SAU header on an IWU cornerkick caromed directly to senior forward Kelsey Johnston who used the top of her head to pop it over a charging Sarah Yancer for the game's only marker.

SAU continued to dominate the second stanza and finished with a 20-5 edge in shots and a 10-2 bulge in corner kicks in the contest.  The loss was Spring Arbor's first since the beginning of September.

"Soccer is a game that can be kind or cruel depending on which side of the coin you see on any given night," commented SAU head coach Jason Crist.  "Our ladies controlled the match and controlled the possession, but just had a hard time finishing tonight.  Credit to IWU and especially Speidel for doing what they needed to do in order to preserve the result.  They played very hard.  If we had finished our opportunities throughout the match, however, the result would have been much different."

The NAIA #6 ranked Cougars had already wrapped up the Crossroads League Championship heading into the match and will be the #1 seed for the upcoming league tournament.  SAU will face off with Bethel College, the #8 seed on Saturday at 3:00 p.m. at the Cougar Soccer Complex.