Women’s Soccer: Western Oregon’s Season Ends Saturday at Northwest Nazarene

The Wolves are 8-9-2, 1-7-1 in GNAC play.

WOU's Chelsea Glavin is one of three seniors playing her last game for WOU Photos: WOU

MONMOUTH - The 2006 Western Oregon soccer season will come to a close Saturday at Northwest Nazarene. Game time is set for noon, MST.

A victory would put the Wolves at an even .500.

They head into the year’s final match with an 8-9-2 record.

Falcons Edge Wolves in Final Minute:

Western Oregon deadlocked with defending conference champion Seattle Pacific for 89 minutes, but the host Falcons scored with 45 seconds left to edge WOU 1-0 on Saturday afternoon at Interbay Stadium. The contest marked the second time this season that the Wolves played the Falcons tough, as SPU also won in tight 2-1 match in Monmouth on Sept. 13th. Seattle Pacific has won four straight Great Northwest Athletic Conference crowns, and reached the NCAA Division II title match last fall.

Fretz on Falcon Match:

“It was a great defensive battle, we really played very well. Ally (Meyer) made some great saves. It was a much better match than we have played at any other time lately, we battled very hard and defended well. They just happened to score at the end.”

Late Viking Blitz KO’s Wolves:

Western Washington broke open a match in which they led 1-0 at halftime, outscoring Western Oregon 4-1 in the second half for a 5-1 win on Thursday night (Oct. 19th) in Bellingham. Three of WWU’s goals came in the final 11 minutes of the match. Including the tight loss to SPU two days later, the Wolves are now 1-7-1 in conference play.

Senior Salute:

Three WOU seniors will play their final collegiate soccer matches this Saturday in Nampa, Idaho. Chelsea Glavin has been a two-year starter for the Wolves, after transferring to Western in 2005. This season, she is tied for second on the team in assists, and has started in every contest except one.

WOU's Amy Weberg

Chelsea is also a standout javelin thrower on the Western Oregon track team, and has the fifth longest throw in school history. Lisa Munyon is a four-year starter for Western, in fact her name has been called out with the starting line-up 74 times since she arrived in 2003 from North Medford High School.

She was the Wolves’ leading scorer last season as a junior, and is currently tied for the club lead this year in goals scored. Lisa was an honorable mention All-Great Northwest Athletic Conference pick last year, and will be a three-time selection to the GNAC All-Academic squad.

WOU's Lisa Munyon

Amy Weberg is a three-year starter and four-year letter winner for Western Oregon. Amy was an honorable mention All-Great Northwest Athletic Conference pick in 2005, and was second on the Wolves in scoring. This season, she is again the Wolves second leading scorer. A native of Vancouver, Washington, Amy was the Greater St. Helen’s League Player of the Year as a senior at Skyview High School.

Crusaders Clips:

Northwest Nazarene is 8-10 on the season, and lists 2-7 in GNAC play. Central Washington upended NNU on Saturday (2-0) and the Crusaders also lost to league-leader Seattle 6-1 last Thursday. NNU has dropped four matches in a row, after winning three straight in late September, which included a 1-0 win over the Wolves in Monmouth. Katy McNutt leads the GNAC in goals scored with 10, and she also has four assists on the season. Carlee Stinton is another scoring threat, having kicked seven goals for the Crusaders. As mentioned earlier, NNU won this year in the first match-up between the two teams, but Western Oregon leads all-time, 12-5.

Scoring = Wins:

It makes good soccer sense, and is especially apparent when looking at the WOU numbers in 2006. When Western Oregon scores, it wins, at least nine of eleven times this season. In seven of WOU’s nine losses and in both of their ties, the Wolves have been shutout. Only in a 2-1 loss to Seattle Pacific on Sept. 13th and in a 5-1 set-back at Western Washington on Oct. 19th did WOU score and not win.

Maggie’s Week:

Sophomore Maggie Kuzmer (Vancouver, Wash./Columbia River) had an exciting week on the WOU Soccer Field two weeks ago. On Oct. 10th, she nailed a free kick from 25-yards out with just four seconds left to defeat Southern Oregon in double overtime, and then followed that up with an insurance goal during the Wolves 2-0 win over Central Washington on Oct. 15th. Last week, she scored WOU’s only goal of the week during a 5-1 loss to Western Washington.

By The Numbers:

WOU’s scoring is balanced in 2006, with junior Liorah Riutzel (Lebanon) leading the way with nine points, with Amy Weberg (Sr., Vancouver, Wash./Skyview HS), Maggie Kuzmer and Aly Reamer (So., Portland/Franklin HS) right behind with eight points each. Ruitzel has gone the assist route to tally her totals (5), while all of Weberg’s and Kuzmer’s points have come on goals (4).

Reamer has three goals and two assists. Lisa Munyon (Sr., Medford, Ore./South Medford HS) and Erica Hibbard (Jr., Vancouver, Wash./Hudson’s Bay) are next with three goals each (six points). Weberg leads the team with 55 shots. Goalkeeper Ally Meyer (Jr., Portland/Central Catholic HS) has a GAA of 1.47 with 107 saves on the season. Her save percentage is .787, and she ranks second in the GNAC in saves per match (5.63) and is fourth in shutouts with five.

Two Are Better Than One:

For the past 10 seasons, Rod Fretz has been the only coach that the WOU soccer program has ever known. But this year, Fretz will share the duties with long-time assistant Kevin Plechl, giving both men the title of co-head coach.

Plechl, a former standout player at Willamette, as been on the WOU sidelines for nine seasons and has a vast coaching background at the club level. “Kevin has progressively taken on more and more of the responsibilities in all areas of our program,” Fretz explained. “He plans the daily practice sessions and runs the majority of the on-field training. Because of some family matters, I may be away from the team from time to time, and this only makes sense to give Kevin the title to go with his added responsibilities.” Fretz’s career record coming into the 2006 season was 82-98-7.

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