Women’s soccer falls to RU in semifinal round

No.1 seeded Radford knocked off the Lady Flames, 4-1

With Thanksgiving and Christmas right around the corner, and regular season play over, all eyes of the Lady Flames women’s soccer team were on one thing — the playoffs.

“The best way to prepare for post-season play is to begin preparing for it immediately after the season ends the year before,” head coach Jessica Hain said.

For the Lady Flames, the playoffs meant redemption. An early exit from the tournament last season left the women hungry for a second chance at the Big South Championship.

“We (prepared) for the Big South Tournament by reviewing where we (had) been this season and in past seasons, training with focus and creating ‘pressure situations’ that (prepared) us to experience the pressure of the tournament before we (began) tournament play,” Hain said.

The Lady Flames knew that the playoffs were their chance to shine and they were motivated to train harder than ever.

“For example, during practice we (trained) with situations like being a goal up or one goal down with 10 minutes to play — but we have been training like this all year,” Hain said.

All of the preparation throughout the season paid off as the Lady Flames bested No. 4 High Point University in a 2-1 overtime win Thursday night. With the win, Liberty advanced to play No. 1 Radford University.

“Our Liberty team will need to play its best game of the season,” Hain said before the match. I believe the girls are ready to embrace the pressure and rise up.”

However, after 90 minutes of play, the Radford University Highlanders came away with the 4-1 victory to advance to the finals.

With the season over, the Lady Flames will look to improve in the off-season and attempt another run at the Big South Championship next year.

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