WINTER PARK â€" Ben Strawbridge pulled out all the stops Friday afternoon in Florida Southern’s first-round game in the NCAA South Region Tournament, including a couple of tricks he hadn’t tried before; but in the end, it was a cruel trick of fate that ended the Moccasins’ season. For the second week in a row, Florida Southern played to a 1-1 tie with Florida Tech in a postseason tournament, only to see the Panthers advance in a penalty kick tie-breaker.
Florida Southern, which finished the year 10-5-4, was playing Florida Tech for the third week in a row, and the Panthers (9-6-3) came out on top in all three of them, if only by winning the tie-breaker in the last two. After defeating the Moccasins 2-0 in the regular season finale in Melbourne, they met again in the semifinals of the Sunshine State Conference Tournament in Davie before squaring off for the final time in Winter Park in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
Friday’s match also marked the second time in the last three years the two teams have faced each other in the opening round at Rollins, with Florida Tech also winning a tie-breaker in 2008. It seemed like a cruel way for the careers of seven Moccasin seniors to end, especially after earning their third consecutive trip to the NCAA playoffs. It was a group of seniors that won 48 games over the last four years, more than the Mocs had won in the first nine years of the program’s existence.
To help jump-start the Mocs’ offense on Friday, Strawbridge moved defender Morgan Sammons to forward where she started for the first time all season. While she also saw time in the back as well, Sammons ended up scoring the game’s first goal, catching up to a downfield pass from Alex Hoover inside the box, and giving the Mocs a 1-0 lead five minutes into the second half. It was the first goal of the season for Sammons, who scored five last year as a freshman while splitting time between forward and defender.
With Sammons playing up front for much of the game, Anna Ott stepped into the lineup on the back line and helped limit Florida Tech to only 10 shots in the game. That combination was almost enough to give Florida Southern a win too, but Florida Tech used a free kick to tie the game in the 84th minute, one of only two shots the Moccasins gave up in the second half.
With the ball positioned just off the 18-yard line on the right side of the field, Chelsea Pushman played it to the left of the Moccasin wall where Casey Lademann ran on to it after breaking out of a crowd from the far side of the box. Her running shot went over the head of Martina Tangen Billing and under the crossbar for her 14th goal of the season.
Florida Tech may have been energized by the late goal, but Florida Southern had the better of it as the second half came to a close. After riding out three corner kicks by Kara Moore in the 88th minute (including one that was dropped by goalkeeper Mist Eliasdottir with Moccasins all around her), the Panthers dodged another bullet when Kerri-Ann Brown hit the crossbar in the 89th. Moccasin defender Kristen Vollmer then made a run into the box late in the 90th minute that ended with Eliasdottir stopping her shot.
Momentum shifted back to Florida Tech in the first overtime period when the Panthers out-shot the Moccasins 4-0. Tangen Billing made two saves though, and the Mocs survived a late corner kick when Rachel Devlin pushed a shot wide as time expired.
In the second overtime, Strawbridge made his most radical move by replacing Tangen Billing, who had six saves, with defender Ashlie Haas, a former high school goalkeeper. It was the first time all year Tangen Billing wasn’t in goal for the Moccasins, and the first time in her 4-year college career that Haas donned a goalkeeper’s jersey. While she didn’t face any shots, Haas did win a scramble in the box when she prevented Chelsea Belfer from scoring and the rest of the defense was able to finish things off to keep the game tied.
That wasn’t all. With still more than two minutes to play in overtime, Haas went all the way forward in the green jersey for a corner kick and got a foot on the ball before it went over the end line. She then raced all the way back downfield before Florida Tech could take advantage of the Mocs’ goalkeeper being out of the net.
With neither team scoring again, the game went to penalty kicks to decide the outcome, and this time, both Haas and Tangen Billing were on the field. Haas remained in goal, and Tangen Billing was selected as one of the five Moccasins to take part in the tie-breaker.
Just as they did a week earlier, the Mocs went first and Moore gave them a one-goal advantage when she banked one off the right post and into the net. Pushman then tied things up for Florida Tech, and after Hanna Jansson was too high for the Moccasins, the Panthers took the lead when Christina Edwards converted their second attempt.
Tangen Billing then converted her penalty kick to tie the score again, but Florida Tech went back on top when Devlin converted. Jackie Bachteler answered for Florida Southern, but when Chrissie Chater scored for Florida Tech, the Panthers were back on top, 4-3. That left Princess Haley as the final shooter for the Moccasins, and her shot was saved by Eliasdottir to end the game.
The first half saw equal possession for both teams, but Florida Tech turned more of those opportunities into shots with a 4-1 advantage at halftime. All of those shots were on target too, and it took a big defensive play on each side to keep the game scoreless.
The first of those came from Tangen Billing, who made a diving save against Kelly Whitaker in the 35th minute. The shot came from the far left wing and was curling toward the far side of the net before Tangen Billing tipped it away by going across her body with her right hand.
When the Panthers couldn’t score on the corner kick, the Mocs went the other way and nearly broke the deadlock themselves. Getting the ball to Brown inside the box, the Mocs finally got their first shot of the game and it was past Eliasdottir, who was out of position on the play. Devlin stopped it, however, to keep Florida Southern off the scoreboard.
Each team finished with 10 shots in the game, but Florida Southern had an 11-3 advantage in corner kicks. Tangen Billing had six saves for Florida Southern, while Eliasdottir had three for Florida Tech. All three of Eliasdottir’s saves came in the second half when she stopped shots by Hoover, Vollmer and Alyssa Abrahamsen.
The Panthers will now advance to the second round where they’ll face top-seeded Rollins on Sunday at noon.
