NORMAL, Ill. - The Illinois State soccer team (11-5-0) will open State Farm Missouri Valley Conference play Friday afternoon at 3:30 p.m., with a semifinal contest against No. 4 seed Evansville (4-11-4) at the Cooper Family Soccer Complex in Springfield, Mo.
The Redbirds earned the No. 1 seed for the Valley Tournament after winning their fourth MVC regular-season title in the last five years and are making their fifth-straight appearance in the MVC Tournament semifinals. ISU enters Valley Tournament play on a five-game winning streak and has outscored opponents, 20-4, in that span. The Redbirds lead the MVC in every offensive category with 45 goals, 36 assists, 126 points, 314 shots and 116 corners.
"Our main goal was to get a first-round bye and avoid the opening round game, and getting the top seed was just a little icing on the cake," head coach Drew Roff said. "Winning the regular-season title means a lot, because it shows the consistency of our program. It shows that we have consistently been strong and we are always contenders in this league."
Illinois State defeated Creighton, 8-1, in last Thursday's regular-season finale and established a new program record for goals in a game. Senior Jessica Carlson and freshman Rachel Tejada broke single-season records in the match, as Carlson recorded her eighth assist and Tejada scored a goal and notched an assist to lift her season point total to 42, surpassing ISU Athletics Hall of Fame inductee Annie Wayland's mark of 41 set in 2000.
"We were playing with a lot of [confidence] against Creighton and we got off to a great start," Roff said. "It ended up being quite a display of finishing and that is something that we have done very well this year. We got a lot of players in the game and a lot of those players got a lot of playing time. Hopefully we can continue to do some of those things we did against Creighton the rest of the season."
Evansville closed its regular-season with a pair of wins in league play to earn the No. 4 seed for the Valley Tournament, including a 1-0, overtime victory over Missouri State in Thursday's regular-season finale. The Purple Aces defeated Drake, 1-0, in an opening round match Sunday to earn a berth to the semifinals. Goalkeeper Chaviel Harrison leads UE with 133 saves and a .806 save percentage in her 1790 minutes in goal. Offensively, Kaitlin Robinett leads Evansville with 12 points on five goals and a pair of assists.
"Evansville is playing its best soccer at the end of the season and went for almost not making the [MVC] tournament to getting the No. 4 seed," Roff said. "They are feeling confident, have very good goalkeeping and athletics up top that gave us some trouble. We are just focusing on what we need to do to beat Evansville and it should be a good match."
In their only meeting this year, Illinois State posted a 3-1 win over the Purple Aces and outshot Evansville, 28-3. Tejada led ISU with a pair of goals and sophomore Kyla Cross netted the game-winner in the 27th minute. Breana Beine recorded the lone goal for the Purple Aces.
GoRedbirds.com: Your online source for Illinois State Athletics, tickets, Weisbecker Scholarship Fund gifts, multimedia, Redbird merchandise, photos and more.
