Haight nets two goals to secure A&M-Commerce win

The women's soccer team knocked off No. 12 Florida Southern at home this weekend, with a 2-1 win on Sunday in a heated affair that included the visitors having a player sent off. Senior Chelsey Haight got both goals on either side of halftime, and the win puts the Lions at 4-1 on the year.

A&M-Commerce opened the scoring in the 20th minute off of a glaring mistake by Florida Southern goalkeeper Martina Tangen. After receiving a pass from a teammate, Tangen missed her kick and allowed Haight to poke the ball away and send it into the back of an empty net.

After the goal, both teams pressed forward looking to score. At halftime the shot count was seven to six, in favor of the Lions.

Florida Southern came out the better of the two sides in the second half, and quickly got a goal back. After a free kick was sent into the middle of the Lions goal area, a scramble ended with Emily Griffith scoring from close range and knotting the game at 1-1.

The Lions slowly managed to get themselves back on the front foot, and eventually got the winner. This time it was the Florida Southern defense that made the mistake that let Haight through on goal. She took the ball away from a central defender, before going in one-on-one with Tangen and beat the goalkeeper low to her right.

The visitors continued to apply pressure, and came dangerously close to finding an equalizer late in the match. Kara Moore sent a long-range shot sailing toward the upper right corner, which clanged off the underside of the cross bar, and it appeared that the ball might have gone over the line. The linesman did not signal for a goal, and the game was allowed to go on.

There were five yellow cards given out in the match, and one red card given to Florida Southern's Anna Ott. A&M-Commerce junior goalkeeper Randi Hafele, who ended the match with eight saves, came out to punch away a crossed ball. After getting some of the ball, Hafele was crashed into by Ott. The referee gave Ott her second yellow, taking Florida Southern down to 10 players.

Florida Southern head coach Ben Strawbridge had a chat with the referee immediately following the red card ,and again after the match. He said while he felt the refereeing of the game was fair, he had a problem with the card distribution.

"I thought the referee did a good job," he said. "The referee can never determine the outcome of a game. Their job is to just call the fouls, and they did a great job calling them. We just disagreed with the way the cards were given out."

The Lions were out shot 13-11 in the match, and head coach Neil Piper said he enjoyed the effort of his team.

"That was great," he said. "We talked about our tactics to begin the game, and I thought in the first half we did it well. When we started the second half, I switched up the style a little bit and I thought we were a little flat. I don't think the goal was the cause of it, but we went back to the high forward and we looked good. It wasn't pretty, but they worked hard and it was a good result for us."

Piper said the pressure is now on his team to keep up their efforts, especially with conference play beginning this week.

"We just can't rest on our laurels now, we have to keep working hard and keep getting better," he said. "I still don't think we've played our best game yet, and we're 4-1. I can see every game we play being like this, because the rest of the way out we've got tough teams."

Haight said the team now has to move on from the match and concentrate on a more crucial part of the season.

"I still think we need to prepare for conference and put this game behind us," she said.

The Lions next home game is Oct. 8 against Angelo State at 7 p.m.