ONU Men's Soccer Set Sights Toward Post-Season Play!

        The Polar Bears are back on the hunt! After a strong performance against Muskingum on senior day, the win put them in second place in the standings as John Carroll and Otterbein both dropped points. These results from other teams were exactly what we needed. This week marks a crucial a week for us as we need to keep the pedal down and focus on 6 points against Baldwin Wallace and Marietta. If we are able to earn 6 points this week, we would put ourselves in the best spot to play in the post-season. 

        Tonight, we face-off against the Yellow Jackets of Baldwin Wallace. They are a mid-table team that are on the stone bubble to play in the OAC season. They are in need of as many points as possible this week to give themselves the best chance to play for the OAC title. This doesn't take away the fact that the Polar Bears need 3 points as well to put them in first place in the standings and receive a first round bye in the OAC tournament. Baldwin Wallace has lots of talent all over the field. However, they lack the ability to play together. Fortunately for the Polar Bears, we have lots of talent all over the field and we have deep chemistry between every player and every position. Having chemistry between the players on the field certainly gives us an edge tonight. The Polar Bears are also coming into this game having some great results in the past few games and have a lot of confidence to earn 3 points tonight. Baldwin Wallace on the other hand is coming into this game having lost to Otterbein 1-0 on Saturday and they are struggling to find a gameplan that works. This game is a great opportunity for the Polar Bears to score loads of goals to gain goal differential that we would potentially need in the event of a tie-breaker. 

        Although our game is extremely important, we are still rooting for other results to happen throughout the conference. For example, John Carroll has a tough match-up against Mount Union tonight and Otterbein has another difficult fixture against Marietta. Otterbein currently has the first place spot in the standings. However, if we are able to earn 6 points this week and Otterbein drops points to Marietta or Mount Union, we would overtake them in the standings and defend our OAC regular season title. The Polar Bears continue their aspirations to play in the NCAA tournament for the second year in a row. According to regional rankings, this week of competition will uncover which teams are the frontrunners to get into the NCAA tournament. We have a team this year that can make a dangerous run in the NCAA tournament if we continue to play how we are right now. The Polar Bears need to continue to keep the pedal to the metal to finish out the OAC and give us the best chance to play in the post-season. 

Go Bears!




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