DES MOINES, Iowa - Ammanda Wisniewski provided all the scoring Illinois State needed to top Drake, 1-0, in the regular-season finale Saturday afternoon. With the win, ISU clinched a share of the Missouri Valley Conference regular-season title with Evansville and earned the No. 2 seed in the upcoming State Farm MVC Tournament.
Wisniewski scored her third goal of the season and her first in the last 10 games. She moved into a tie with Jess Carlson for second place on the team with 10 points on the year. Raquel Rattray assisted Wisniewski's goal. Sasha Reiber, the defending Brine MVC Defensive Player of the Week, made three saves to record her sixth shutout of the season and her fifth against a Valley opponent. Her six shutouts this season are tied for the fourth-most in ISU single-season history.
The Redbirds finished the regular season 11-7-1 and 5-1-0 in MVC play to earn its second-consecutive regular-season conference crown. The Redbirds last won back-to-back regular season MVC titles in 1998 and 1999.
ISU and Evansville tied for the conference regular season title, but Evansville earned the top-seed in the conference tournament by virtue of beating Illinois State in the regular season. The Redbirds receive a bye into the semifinals of the tournament and will play the winner of the Drake/Indiana State quarterfinal Friday, Nov. 7, at 5 p.m.
"This was a great win for us," said ISU head coach Drew Roff. "We knew going into it how important this game was for postseason play. The difference between a No. 2 and a No. 3 seed is huge because winning three games is five days is a challenge. We knew that if we could win today then we would secure the No. 2 seed and get the bye into the semifinals. The chance to win a share of the conference title provided a lot of motivation because a lot of these players won it last year and wanted to do it again."
The game was a defensive struggle early on as neither team recorded a shot until 15 minutes into the action. ISU took the lead just before the end of the first half. With the clock ticking down, the Redbirds advanced the ball down the field and Rattray crossed the ball into the middle, where Wisniewski was able to put a one-time shot into the back of the net to put ISU ahead.
"It was a really physical, hard-fought game because flooding in the spring left the field in pretty poor condition," Roff said. "We had a hard time controlling the ball the way we usually do, so we had to change our style of play a little bit. To win a championship, you have to win in different ways on different days and we definitely showed the ability to do that today. We were able to score at the end of the first half and really held on with grit and toughness at the end. A win like this shows the kind of character that these players have."
Illinois State held a 10-8 advantage in shots. Drake had all four of its corner kicks in the second half, but couldn't capitalize on any of them.
The Redbirds finished the regular season on a five-game winning streak, outscoring their opponents 10-2 during that span. The over Drake was ISU's third-straight over the Bulldogs after going winless in the first seven meetings of the series.
