Soccer can clinch MAC regular season title Friday against Bowling Green

The soccer team will have a chance to clinch the regular season Mid-American Conference title for the first time in program history.

The Chippewas (13-3, 8-0) will play Bowling Green (5-9-3, 1-4-3) at 4 p.m. today and Toledo (9-5-2, 5-2-1) at 1 p.m. on Sunday at the CMU Soccer Complex.

“It is everything that we worked for these years,” said senior forward Amanda Waugh. “If we do it my senior year, it is a perfect ending because we have gone through a lot of adversity.”

Central is in first place in the MAC with an 11-game winning streak — all wins coming by shutout — while the Falcons are still trying to get into the MAC tournament, which only takes the top eight teams in the conference.

Bowling Green sits in 10th place in the MAC and is two points out of eighth place.

But senior midfielder Stephanie Martin said the team is cautious about the Falcons.

“Bowling Green has always been a really hard game for us,” she said. “They are fighting to get into the tournament, so it will be a good game either way.”

The Falcons are coming off their first MAC win last weekend against Buffalo where freshman Keely Chandler scored the game-winning goal off of a corner kick just five minutes and 36 seconds into the game. It was all the Falcons needed, as they beat the Bulls 1-0.

Bowling Green has shut out its last two opponents with the help of redshirt junior goalie Alexa Arsenault, fourth in the MAC with 70 saves on the season.

Junior Valerie Prause said the team has been working to create more chances offensively and to finish them in order to put the pressure on the opposition.

“It is huge because our defense (would have) a lot of the pressure taken off them,” she said. “We can play more free.”

One last game

On Sunday, it will be the last regular season home game for the seniors.

CMU will take on a Toledo team it has not beat since a 5-0 win in 2001. Toledo also handed Central its only home loss in the last two years with a 1-0 win Oct. 19 last season.

“Sunday is senior day and it is Toledo,” Martin said. “I haven’t beaten them once yet, so it will be a really hard fight.”

The Rockets are in second place in the MAC and have won the last three MAC tournaments.

Toledo is led offensively by two-time reigning MAC player of the year, senior Molly Cornwell, who is third in the MAC with 13 points on the year. Toledo senior Ali Leak is tied for eighth in the MAC with 10 points.

The two have led the Rockets in points, shots and goals all four years since coming to Toledo from Pickerington North High School in Pickerington, Ohio.