Louise Vraney
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#19 Panthers Head To Chicago For League Championship
Milwaukee in search of fifth league tournament title
THIS WEEK IN PANTHER SOCCER
(3) Wright State v. #19 (2) Milwaukee
Game #21: Friday, Nov. 7 • 7 p.m. • Chicago, Ill.
Gameday Media: Live Video, Gametracker
Horizon League Championship
Game #22: Sunday, Nov. 9 • 1 p.m. • Chicago, Ill.
Gameday Media: Live Video, Gametracker
• Complete Release in PDF Format 
MILWAUKEE, Wis. (Nov. 5, 2008) - The 19th-ranked University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee women's soccer team heads to Chicago this weekend in search of its first Horizon League Tournament Championship since 2005. The second-seeded Panthers take on No. 3 Wright State Friday at 7 p.m. at Loyola Soccer Park. The winner of that match moves on to the league title game Sunday at 1 p.m. against the winner of No. 1 Loyola and No. 4 Butler. Milwaukee has made a league-record nine title-game appearances, including a 2-2 tie in the 2007 game against Loyola.
The "Silver" Anniversary
The Panthers are playing their 25th season as a varsity sport. The team will be celebrating the occasion all season long, recognizing outstanding achievements and moments in UWM women's soccer history. The squad will also be wearing special patches commemorating the season.
Getting Noticed
The Panthers are 19th in the NSCAA national poll, marking the sixth-straight week they have been nationally ranked. They have also held strong in the Soccer America top-25 at No. 19 and moved up one spot to 17th in the Soccer Buzz national poll. In the region, Milwaukee reclaimed its No. 2 ranking in the NSCAA Great Lakes Poll behind national No. 1 Notre Dame.
Fun With The RPI
The NCAA released its third and final RPI of the season Tuesday, with Milwaukee making a five-spot jump to No. 21 in the nation. The Panthers were No. 34 in the first RPI released Oct. 7 and rose to No. 26 Oct. 21. UWM has gained its standing thanks in part to nine non-league top-100 opponents, which they boast a 6-1-2 record against. In fact, of the team's 11 non-league opponents, just one in the bottom half of the 318-team rating system and the average place of the 11 teams is 85.
A Look At The Opposition - Wright State
The Raiders claimed the third seed in the league tournament without playing the final weekend of the season. They then shook off the rust with a 4-1 win over No. 6 Cleveland State in the league quarterfinals. On offense, Wright State is led by all-league first teamers Amber Kasmer and Jess Rooma. Kasmer has a team-high seven goals and 17 points, while Rooma has six goals and 16 points. Meghan Hackerson has played every minute in goal for WSU and has posted eight shutouts and a 1.06 goals against average.
How The Other Half Lives
Should the Panthers advance to the title game, they would face either No. 1 Loyola or No. 4 Butler. The Ramblers shared a regular season title with UWM and handed Milwaukee its first league loss in five years. Cynthia Morote-Ariza was named league player of the year for the second-straight year and leads the league with 47 points and the nation with 19 assists.
Butler has had an up and down season, starting 4-1 in the league before dropping its final three league matches of the season. Molly Kruger leads the squad with 30 points on 11 goals and eight assists in her first season since transfering from UCLA.
Series History
Milwaukee holds commanding series advantages over all three potential opponents this weekend, including a 18-6-1 edge over Friday's foe, Wright State. The Panthers are 7-0-1 in the last eight meetings and are 2-1-2 all-time against the Raiders in the league tournament.
Loyola defeated UWM for just the second time ever this season, while the Panthers are ahead 14-2-3 in the series. Meanwhile, they have defeated Butler 15-straight times, including a 5-0 rout in Milwaukee during the regular season. UWM and Butler have met in the league tournament in 10 of the Panthers' 14 seasons as a member of the Horizon League, with Milwaukee posting a 7-1-2 record.
Last Week In Review
Sunday - Milwaukee 5, Green Bay 0
Five different players scored goals and the Panthers outshot Green Bay, 27-1, as UWM advanced to the Horizon League semifinals with a 5-0 win over the Phoenix Sunday afternoon at Engelmann Field.
League Awards
Milwaukee placed a school-record five players on the all-league first team when the league announced its post-season awards last week. Seniors Erin Kane and Sarah Teegarden were each honored for the fourth time in their careers, making them the first teammates in league history to do so. Juniors Kate Megna and Erin Kreuser also made the first team, as did freshman Sarah Hagen. Hagen, who has tied a league record with 21 goals, was also named the 2008 Horizon League Newcomer of the Year. She is the third Panther to win the award, following Ginny Graczyk in 2003 and Lisa Bengtsson in 2000. She was then joined on the all-newcomer team by freshmen Mary Wandolowski and Keara Thompson.
Coach Of The Year
Head coach Michael Moynihan was named the Horizon League Coach of the Year for the second-straight season and the sixth time in his career. Under his leadership, the Panthers claimed a ninth-straight league regular season championship and have been nationally ranked for much of the season. He also surpassed the school record for wins by a soccer coach, eclipsing the 136 wins Louis Bennett posted with the men's team from 1996-05. Moynihan's career win total is now just two shy of 150 (148).
Panther Of The Week
For the final three weeks of the regular season, a Panther was the recipient of the league's player of the week award. Sarah Hagen was last week's honoree, as she was Oct. 13. Senior Sarah Teegarden was was the player of the week in the week in between Oct. 20. Hagen now has three weekly awards, while junior Kate Megna also has one honor (Sept. 22), giving Milwaukee five on the year.
Gonna Need More Than One Shelf
Sarah Hagen was named the Horizon League Player of the Week for second time in three weeks Oct. 27. She earned the honor three times this season. Hagen has also been named to three national teams of the week, including the Soccer Buzz National Elite Team of the Week Sept. 1 and Sept. 8. She pulled double-duty Sept. 8, also appearing on Soccer America's team.
Panthers In The League Tournament
Milwaukee has fared pretty well in the Horizon League Tournament over the years posting a 19-7-6 record. That figure includes an 8-4-2 mark in the semifinals and a league-record nine appearances in the league title game (2-3-4). The Panthers have been in six penalty kick shootouts, going 3-3 in them.
Winning Is Contagious
Believe it or not, the Panthers' 15-2-2 start was their second-best record after 19 games in team history. The 2006 squad went 16-2-1 in that same stretch. But, this season, their 16-2-2 is the best 20-game record in school history and is tied with that 2006 team for the school wins record. Milwaukee's .850 win percentage is more than 75 points better than what the 2006 team finished at to establish a school record (.773). The Panthers are currently tied for fourth in the nation in wins and tied for 10th in win percentage.
Way To Rebound
When UWM lost to Loyola, 1-0, it marked the first time this season the Panthers had been shut out. In fact, the scoreless outing was their first since a 0-0 draw with Iowa Oct. 5. In that time, Milwaukee put together a school-record streak of 21-straight games without being shut out. The Panthers have rebounded with 29 goals in their last seven games, an average of 4.1 per game. For the season, UWM has 56 goals, which is its first time with at least 40 goals since 1997, the second-most in school history and sixth in the nation. The team is averaging 2.80 goals per game, which is 10th nationally.
C'mon, Everybody's Doing It...
Despite one player's numbers jumping off the stat page (21 goals... 46 points), a host of Panthers are getting in the scoring habit. Eight players have reached double-figures in points, including Kate Megna's 20 points. UWM now has two players with 20-plus points for the first time since 1997. The eight 10-point scorers are a school record, surpassing the five Milwaukee had in 1993.
Miss Automatic
Sarah Hagen has scored a goal in each of her last seven games, tying the longest goal-scoring streak in school history. Incidentally, the longest streak was set by Hagen to start the season. For the season, she has scored goals in 16-of-20 games and tallied at least a point in 17. Five times this season she has scored two goals, another school record.
Record-Breaker
With 21 goals in a season, records are bound to get broken. Hagen topped the school record for freshman goals with her 13th goal Oct. 13. She broke the school single-season goal-scoring mark Oct. 17 against Butler with No. 18 and used a goal and two assists to push her point total to 40 break the points record (38) Oct. 24 against Detroit. Then, the last two Sundays, she has tied the league freshman record with her 20th goal against Valparaiso Oct. 26. This past Sunday, she tallied No. 21 to tie the league record for goals in a season.
Freshman Doing Big Things
Hagen leads the nation with her 21 goals by two goals and is tied for third with 46 points, just one back of the top spot. In per-game averages, which the NCAA bases its rankings on, she is fifth in goals per game (1.05) and eighth in points per game (2.30). It goes without saying, but Hagen leads the league in goals and is one back in points. She is looking to become the first freshman to lead the league in both categories since Detroit's Cindy Fix in 1993.
Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner
Of Milwaukee's 16 wins this season, six have been decided by one of Sarah Hagen's goals. Her six game-winners are a school record, breaking the previous mark of five. Senior Sarah Teegarden was one of four Panthers that had tallied five in a season, doing so in 2006.
Helping Hands... Er... Feet
Junior Kate Megna leads the team with 10 assists, a figure that is second in the league and tied for third in school history. Meanwhile, junior Erin Kreuser is one back with nine assists this season. Both players entered the season with eight career assists and are now in the top five in school history in career helpers. Megna now has 18, which is fourth, and Kreuser has 17, which is fifth. Both players are key members of the offense, as Megna is second on the team with 20 points, which would have been the most by a Panther since 2002 if it were not for Sarah Hagen. Kreuser tallied her first goal of the season to go with her nine assists Oct. 26. She then followed that up with another goal in the league quarterfinals.
Everybody's Helping Out
Sophomore Nicole Sperl is tied for second on the team with nine assists, which happens to be tied for fifth-most in a season in school history. Along with Kreuser and Megna, the team has already accumulated a school-record 61 assists this season. The record had been 50, set by the 1997 team. Also, this season marks the first time UWM has featured three players with at least seven assists.
Doing It On Defense, Too
UWM's also rebounded from that loss to post five-straight shutouts before surrendering a goal Oct. 26. The five-game shutout streak was Milwaukee's first since it tied a school record with six-straight toward the end of the 2006 season. Over the last seven games, the Panthers have outshot their opponents by an average of 21.1-4.7 and allowed just the one goal. The long stretch gave the team some eye-popping league numbers this season. In eight games, UWM allowed just two goals and an average of 5.5 shots per game, while gaining five more corners per game, as well (6.6-1.5).
She Loves League Play
During the shutout streak, senior Erin Kane had a personal shutout streak of 508:18, the fourth-longest in school history. She owns the four longest streaks and is the only keeper in school history to carry a streak over 500 minutes. But, Kane's success against league teams comes as no surprise. This season, she went 6-1 with a 0.29 GAA. In her career, her numbers look something like this: 0.32 GAA, 25-1-2 record and 17 shutouts in 29 career league matches. She has also shared three shutouts in that time and not allowed more than one goal in a league contest.
Home, Sweet Home
The Panthers have the best home record in the nation at 11-0 this season and are riding a 22-match home unbeaten streak (19-0-3). They also have a streak of 35-straight regular season home games without a loss (30-0-5) that remains intact for another season. And, if you include post-season contests, the team is still an impressive 34-1-6 at home over its last 41 home matches. Milwaukee is also unbeaten in their last 32 league home matches (31-0-1), dating back to Oct. 11, 1998.
Iron Women
As four-year starters, seniors Sarah Teegarden and Erin Kane are bound to play in their fair share of matches. In fact, Teegarden extended her school record for career starts to 83 games last Sunday. Kane, meanwhile, started career game No. 82. Both have started every game they played and are closing in on the school record of 85 career games played. As a goalkeeper, Kane's feat appears even more impressive. She long passed the school record for career minutes played, but she is creeping up on the league mark and needs just 63:18 to meet that mark.
League Run
The Panthers had their league-record 31-game league unbeaten streak (29-0-2) snapped Oct. 3 at Loyola. That streak became a league record during the 2006 season. The previous record also belonged to Milwaukee, a 21-game (20-0-1) stretch that immediately preceded the current streak. Since the turn of the century, the Panthers are 55-2-3 in league play.
First Place In The Big Ten
Milwaukee's win over Northwestern Sept. 24 pushed the Panthers' record against Big Ten opponents this season to 3-0 and extended their unbeaten streak against the conference to seven (5-0-2). Milwaukee is the only non-Big Ten team in the nation with three wins against the conference and is one of five to have played three games against Big Ten foes.
State Champs
UWM went undefeated against the other three Division I schools in Wisconsin for the second time in three seasons and pushed its unbeaten streak against state schools to nine games (8-0-1) with a win over Green Bay Sept. 26. The Panthers have not lost to one of the three other Division I schools in the state since 2005. They went 3-0 in 2006 and last season boasted a 2-0-1 record. UWM owns three-straight wins over UW and five-straight over Green Bay. And, finally, Milwaukee has defeated Marquette in 2006 and 2008, with the two teams tying in 2007.
M-V-P ... M-V-P ... M-V-P
Kate Megna was named the Offensive MVP at the Minnesota Gold Classic, the team's second tourney MVP this season. Sarah Hagen earned MVP honors at the Milwaukee Cup to start the season. Both players also earned all-tournament honors at each tournament, as has senior Sarah Teegarden. Freshman Keara Thompson rounded out the Milwaukee Cup representatives, while freshman Mary Wandolowski was also honored in Minnesota.
We Are The Champions
Earlier this season, the Panthers claimed their second-straight Milwauee Cup title. They defeated Ohio State 4-3 on Aug. 27 and Samford 4-2 on Aug. 29 to claim the title. For the third-straight year, co-hosts UWM and Marquette each went 2-0, but this is the second in a row the Panthers claimed the title on the goals scored tiebreaker.
A Few Extra Notes
Senior Erin Kane picked up shutout No. 40 Sept. 19 against Boston University. She is the only player in school and league history to crack the 30-shutout mark and reached 40 in just 71 games ... The Panthers tied Bradley's men's team for an NCAA record with a 24-game unbeaten streak in overtime matches (10-0-14). The streak reached 24 with a tie at New Mexico Sept. 12 and ended in OT two days later against UNLV ... After Ohio State knotted the game at 3-3 on Aug. 27, Nicole Sperl converted the go-ahead goal just 18 seconds later on a penalty kick. It was the third-fastest response goal in school history ... Sarah Hagen was the third Panther freshman to score two goals in her collegiate debut, following Louise Vraney in 2006 and Katie Waltenberger in 1997. This season also marked the third-straight season-opener in which a freshman scored, including Sarah Talbert's first career goal last season ... Vraney has scored on the opening day of each of her three seasons, including Aug. 22 against Wisconsin. No other player in team history has scored on an opening day more than once.
Megna's Memoirs Part Deux
Junior Kate Megna is once again providing her take on the Panthers' season as it goes on, via an online blog at uwmpanthers.com. At the start of every week, Megna looks back on the weekend of action and shares the inside story of the Milwaukee women's soccer team. Visit uwmpanthers.com for the latest installment, which is posted on Monday afternoons. Fans can also follow along with all of UWM's sports at the Verizon Wireless Panther Blogzone. The Blogzone is the perfect place to get a little extra information on your favorite Panther teams.
Next Up
Regardless of the outcome this weekend, the Panthers will be gathering to watch the NCAA Tournament selection show Monday, Nov. 10, at 7 p.m. If a league tournament title is not in the cards for UWM, it will await word on possibly the second at-large bid in school history.
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