MOREHEAD, MINN. – It has been quite the turnaround for the St. Catherine University soccer program. Just five seasons ago, the Wildcats finished their season with an abysmal 1-17 record and no wins in Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC).
Now, St. Kate's is once again headed to the MIAC postseason tournament.
The Wildcats entered Saturday afternoon's game at Concordia College in Morehead, Minnesota with one very simple scenario: win and you're in. When it mattered most, St. Kate's earned a huge 3-0 win over Concordia to clinch its second straight berth to the MIAC soccer playoffs.
"I couldn't be more proud of our team and program," a beaming head soccer coach
Chris Citowicki said after the game. "Over the years we've have completely changed the direction of this program and it's awesome."
However, after going through the first half deadlocked 0-0, it looked like the win St. Kate's desperately needed might be in jeopardy. Net-minder
Jessica Perez-Adame (San Jacinto, Calif. / San Jacinto) and the Wildcat defense stifled the Cobber offense, but the team's offense was unable to boot the ball past Concordia's Maddy Reed, resulting in a 0-0 tie after the first 45 minutes of play.
That all changed at the 63
rd minute of the game. After 20 minutes in the second half passed without any change in score,
Kaitlin Machovec (Woodbury, Minn. / North St. Paul) scored her fourth goal in three games to but St. Kate's up 1-0 at 63:24. While that would prove to be enough for the Wildcats,
Nicole Palsgrove (Maple Grove, Minn. / Wayzeta) scored an insurance goal exactly three minutes later with Machovec assisting on the play.
Machovec, along with her fellow teammates, simple weren't satisfied with a 2-0 lead, though. After Concordia committed a foul inside the penalty box at the 75
th minute, Machovec was awarded a penalty kick. The one-on-one play went much better for Machovec than Reed, as the sophomore scored her second goal of the game and fifth of the week to seal the Wildcats 3-0 victory.
"We've gone through so many changes over and it's awesome to see where we are at now as a team and program."
With the win, St. Kate's finished the regular season with an 11-5-1 record and a 6-4-1 mark in MIAC play. More impressively, the team earned its second consecutive bid to the conference tournament, this time as the No. 4 seed. It's the highest finish in the conference standings for the Wildcats in program history, meaning the team will host the first playoff game in program history at St. Kate's sometime next week.
