The Valley on ESPN (subscription required) vs. Illinois State | Live Stats vs. Illinois State | MVC Championship Bracket | Loyola Game Notes | Illinois State Game Notes
CHICAGO (October 31, 2018) – Fresh off capturing its first Missouri Valley Conference regular season title in program history, the Loyola University Chicago women's soccer team will open play in the 2018 MVC Women's Soccer Championship on Friday evening. Fourth-seeded Illinois State will provide the opposition to the top-seeded Ramblers at 6 p.m. from inside Loyola Soccer Park, which will serve as the host to both the semifinals and championship game.
Last Time Out: Loyola cruised to a 6-1 win over Evansville in the regular-season finale for both teams last Thursday in Rogers Park. Senior
Madison Kimball, who was named The Valley's Offensive Player of the Week on Monday, netted the first hat trick of her career, while junior
Sienna Cruz, freshman
Bella Lestina and senior
Eleni Carr added single tallies.
vs. Illinois State: Illinois State, currently sitting at 10-8-2, picked up a 1-0 win over fifth-seeded Missouri State last Sunday to book its spot in the semifinals. Abby Basler scored with just under 15 minutes remaining in regulation to send the Redbirds to Chicago. Illinois State finished Missouri Valley Conference play at 4-3-0, winning three of their final four games to close out the regular season. Second-year head coach Brad Silvey's team sports an impressive attack that features 11 different players who have found the back of the net this season. Basler and Kate Del Fava lead the way for that pack, having each scored five times. Haley Smith has started in all 20 contests in goal for Illinois State. Smith, who has three shutouts to her name, holds a 1.34 goals against average and a 0.790 save percentage on the year.
Series Stuff: Friday's second semifinal will mark the 19th meeting in the all-time series between Loyola and Illinois State in women's soccer. The Redbirds have prevailed in 14 of the previous 18 encounters, including a stretch that has seen the Illinois State go 8-1-0 in their previous nine clashes with the Ramblers. Loyola's lone victory in the aforementioned nine-game run came back on November 1, 2015 when goals from
Avalon Senn-Raemont and Shelby Koch pushed Loyola past Illinois State by a final score of 2-1 in an opening-round game of the 2015 MVC Women's Soccer Championship at Adelaide Street Field in Normal, Ill. In the meeting between the two teams earlier this season,
Jenna Ross and Jenny Szczesny both tallied goals but Mikayla Unger's strike just under three minutes into overtime proved to be the difference as Redbirds escaped Loyola Soccer Park with a 3-2 victory, handing Loyola their only conference loss of the season.
Up Next: A win over Illinois State would book Loyola's spot in the championship game of the 2018 Missouri Valley Conference Women's Soccer Championship, where it would face the winner of Friday's second semifinal featuring second-seeded Drake and sixth-seeded Evansville at 1 p.m. on Sunday afternoon for The Valley's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.