Women's Soccer: Raiders win, fail to capture HL

It was a bittersweet night for the Wright State women’s soccer team.

The Raiders defeated the Cleveland State Vikings 1-0. Meanwhile in Detroit, UM-Milwaukee topped Oakland 1-0 to clinch its third straight Horizon League title.

Had Milwaukee lost or tied versus Oakland, the Raiders would have been crowned the league champs.

The win was good for clinching a bye through the quarterfinal round of the Horizon League Tournament. The Raiders travel to Milwaukee for the semifinals Friday. After that, WSU could look for revenge as the Raiders have met UW-Milwaukee two years in a row in a row for the title. The Panthers won both contests.

“One of our seniors mentioned, 'well that has felt like our home field for the conference tournament,'” WSU head coach Patrick Ferguson said. “We’re comfortable in that setting, we’re used to it.”

At the beginning of the season, the Raiders were selected to finish No. 2 in the conference behind UW-Milwaukee. Those predictions were deadly accurate. Despite the predictions, Ferguson said the regular season went better than expected.

“We’re not deep, we don’t have a lot of players,” Ferguson said. “A big part is about the team chemistry and avoiding injuries. The chemistry is great, the injuries we avoided. I thought the season went better than expected.”

The Raiders outshot the Vikings 16-4 for the contest. Despite Wright State’s play, it took 79 minutes for the Raiders to get on the board. Defender Liz Soto notched her third goal of the season in the 80th minute to give WSU the go-ahead goal.

“Defensively we were solid, they had no clear opportunities to score,” Ferguson said. “I thought we possessed the ball very well. Could have been 1-0 could, have been 7-0.”

The squad will leave Ohio for Milwaukee Thursday and take on a to be determined opponent Friday afternoon.