Women’s Soccer wins NEWMAC championship
MIT Women’s Soccer beat WPI 3-0 to win the championship game held on Saturday Nov. 12 at the Steinbrenner Stadium
Maxwell Yun–The Tech
MIT Women’s soccer defended the NEWMAC championship as they defeated WPI 3-0 Saturday Nov. 12. This game was the perfect revenge for three years ago, when WPI beat MIT 3-1 in the 2016 championship game. With this victory the team also got an automatic bid to the NCAA Division III Championship Tournament.
The first half of the game went scoreless as both teams kept their defenses tight. Even though MIT pushed a lot more on the attacking end, they still lacked legitimate opportunities. Contrary to the first half, the second half started excellently for MIT as they got the first goal of the game two minutes into the half. The goal came off a hard deflection from a WPI defender as she tried defending a cross from Emily Berzolla ’20. This was followed by a second goal by MIT as Karenna Groff ’22 found the back of the net 69 minutes into the game via an assist from Claire O'Callaghan ’20. The Engineers eventually ended the game with yet another goal, this time scored by O’Callaghan, who found the net from 30 yards out.
Top performers of the game included O’Callaghan who had one assist and one goal, Groff who scored her 16th goal of the season, becoming the first student athlete to score 16 or more goals since Kelli Griffin in 2001! Another individual accolade was awarded to an MIT athlete, as captain Berzolla was named the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player for the second consecutive season.
Moving on to the NCAA tournament MIT will play Great Northeast Athletic Conference (GNAC) winner Johnson & Wales University on Saturday, Nov. 16 at 11:00 a.m. at the Steinbrenner Stadium.