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Written by: Robbie LaBrie
The Bentley women’s soccer team has ran into some troubles to end the season and are now looking at some pretty tough odds to get into the Northeast-10 tournament.
The Falcons have gone 2-4 so far in October, which is not helpful for a team that was already sitting in the middle of the pack in the NE-10.
The biggest struggles have come on offense, as they have been shut out three times so far in those six games and have failed to score more than two goals in any of the games.
Unfortunately all of Bentley’s matchups have come against NE-10 opponents, making the losses hurt even worse in the standings. The Falcons are now 12th in the conference, while the top 8 make the conference tournament.
The month of October started off with a close 1-0 loss to the best team in NE-10, Saint Rose, who hasn’t lost a game all season, in conference or not.
It was a rainy day in Waltham and the Golden Knights got off to a 1-0 lead late in the first half and from there good defense would prevail, as there would be no scoring for the rest of the game.
Saint Rose had the advantage in time of possession and shots but goalie Kara Smith and the rest of the Falcons defense played very well to only give up one goal to the high-octane Saint Rose offense.
Unfortunately, Saint Rose is a team that has dished out 12 shutouts in 16 games and the Falcons fell victim to the Golden Knights unbreakable defense in this one.
Bentley then traveled to UMass-Lowell where they took on the third place team in the Northeast-10 and were served a tough 3-0 loss.
Senior Cheryl Boyd took over the next game, however, propelling her Falcons to a 2-0 win over Southern Connecticut. Boyd scored both of Bentley’s goals, making it seven for her this season, which leads the team and makes it three seasons in a row she’s recorded at least seven.
The next game was another rough one for Bentley as they watched four different Stonehill players score goals to lead Stonehill to a 5-0 win over Bentley.
The Falcons would bounce back nicely in their next game though, as they saw freshman Laura Muise score two goals and Smith make every save to lead Bentley to a 2-0 victory over Assumption.
Muise’s first goal came from close range after fellow freshman Dovlyn Curtis got the helper.
Then in the second half, Muise headed in a corner kick from Boyd to ice the game and give Bentley a win.
Then on Tuesday, Bentley took on Southern New Hampshire in Waltham and were handed a 2-1 loss. Muise got the Falcons out to a 1-0 lead in the first half after a nice cross from Boyd for her fourth goal of the season.
But Southern New Hampshire sophomore Ariel Teixeira became the newest enemy named Teixeira in this area, as she came out of the intermission and scored two second half goals just minutes apart, giving the Penmen the 2-1 win.
The first goal came off a rebound from Smith, then the second one sniped the left hand corner to give Southern New Hampshire the lead and eventually the win.
The Falcons could still lock up the eighth spot in the tournament, but they need a lot of help. They will have to win their last two games against Adelphi and Saint Anslem and they would need some more help.
They would also need Stonehill and New Haven to both lose their last two games of the season and they need Saint Anselm to lose their game against American International on Saturday to lock up their spot.
This all makes it very unlikely that the Falcons will be fighting for the conference title this season.
Next season, Bentley will be losing a couple key players in Cheryl Boyd and Hayley Traeger, two of Bentley’s three captains this season.
Traeger has been a solid defender/midfielder in all four of her years at Bentley. She has played almost every game she could and will be a missed asset for the Falcons.
Boyd, meanwhile, has been the face of women’s soccer at Bentley, leading the team in scoring for the last three years. She has had a great career and is certainly irreplaceable.
It seems as though Bentley has a solid young core moving forward, though, and they should be able to get things going next year, hopefully with a more successful run than they had this season. Time will tell if Bentley can overcome their struggles and finish this season strong and play well heading into next year.
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