Oct. 22, 2014 By Andrew Lowe
The Women’s soccer team has put together quite a winning streak. With a win over UW-Stout and UW-Oshkosh this past weekend, the ’Hawks clinched their unprecedented fifth straight WIAC conference regular season championship.
To go along with that streak, the ’Hawks have also won 28 straight WIAC conference matches, with one game remaining in the season.
The ’Hawks took on UW-Oshkosh at home on Oct. 15.
The Warhawks took down the Titans by a score of 1-0 and the lone goal was credited to sophomore Carina Krausert, her third of the season, early in the first half.
Head coach Ryan Quamme said he was pleased with the play of his team against the Titans.
“I was very pleased with our teams’ approach, focus, energy and effort in the Oshkosh game.” Quamme said. “We had great intensity from the beginning of the match and created numerous quality scoring opportunities on the evening.”
The next matchup for the ’Hawks was against UW-Stout on Oct. 18. Stout brought their ‘A’ game to Whitewater, which made the Warhawks play that much harder to achieve the win.
In a double overtime game, sophomore Brianna Reid sent a cross into the box that was redirected into the back of the net by freshman Jordan Jackson to secure the 1-0 win and fifth straight WIAC conference title for women’s soccer.
“When I scored I couldn’t even believe what had just happened,” Jackson said. “I remember heading the ball and then all of the sudden I was swarmed by my team for what seemed like forever.”
Quamme said he was impressed how the team responded after a tough game.
“Stout was a hard fought physical match and I’m proud of the way the women battled to the end to find a result,” Quamme said. “What made the match more difficult was it came on the heels of the Oshkosh game.”
Defense has been the topic of conversation when it comes to the reason for success for the ’Hawks this season. The Warhawks shut outs of both Oshkosh and Stout this past week bring their total number of shutouts on the year to nine in 16 matches this season.
Seniors Sarah Sedlar, Kaitlyn Fritsch and Jordan Myers have anchored the defense for the ’Hawks this season and it continued these past two matches.
“Those three all [gave] great efforts on the defensive end this past week and their individual efforts were key to our team posting consecutive shutouts against Stout and Oshkosh,” Quamme said.
The ’Hawks have had their fair share of success on the field this season, but are looking to continue to improve finishing out the season and going into postseason play.
“We need to keep striving for improvement especially in our ability to finish in the attacking third,” Quamme said. “I’m happy with where we are at currently, but our team has more in us, and we will need to become more efficient on both sides of the ball as we approach postseason play.”
The ’Hawks will finish up the season with matches against Macalester College at 7 p.m. Oct. 21 at home, UW-Superior on the road Oct. 25, and Marian University at 7 p.m. Oct. 29 at home.
“We can limit our number of forced errors and turnovers per game,” Sedlar said. “By tackling these few things, it will allows us to become more consistent in our play and better prepare us for the upcoming tournaments.”
