Women’s Soccer’s Season Ends in KCAC Tournament Quarterfinal

BARTLESVILLE, Okla. – Avila women's soccer's 2023 campaign came to an end on Saturday afternoon in Oklahoma, where the No. 8-seeded Eagles (6-12-1) fell to No. 1-seeded Oklahoma Wesleyan (14-2-3) 5-0 in the quarterfinals of the 2023 KCAC Women's Soccer Championship Tournament.

Oklahoma Wesleyan cruised to yet another undefeated (though not unblemished) regular season conference campaign en route to the regular season league title and the top spot in the conference tournament yet again. OKWU are the undisputed champions of women's (and men's) soccer in the KCAC, and this year's Eagle team is as good as ever.

Avila put together a couple of important results over the final two weeks of the regular season just to make it to the conference tournament for the fifth time in six seasons under Katie LaForge, but unfortunately for the Eagles they received the same bittersweet reward as they earned for their late regular-season run last year: a trip to Oklahoma and a date with the tournament's top seeds in the first round of the postseason, the quarterfinals in an 8-team field.

That's an unfavorable, unenviable draw for just about every team in the KCAC, and though Avila has played OKWU tough at times over the last few years, this time around Oklahoma Wesleyan doubled up on its win in Kansas City in the regular season with a 5-0 triumph in the postseason on Saturday afternoon.

Avila knew what it was getting into after the Eagles had to make this trip to face this same opponent this time last year. But this year's Eagle team performed much better than last, keeping the vaunted OKWU Eagles well within reach until the game's final half hour. Elise Lofnertz, a defender by trade who has been moved up top in recent games, scored twice to give Oklahoma Wesleyan a 2-0 halftime lead, but that was all they would manage until just past the hour mark, where presumptive KCAC Player of the Year Tania Mocholi finally took over, scoring three times in the final half hour to put the game out of reach.

OKWU goalkeeper Aida Sanchez has certainly been beatable this year, and Avila was credited with four shots on her in the match, from Nakita Wood, Suzie Lopez, Megan Nugent and Brooke Clark. Olivia Seston, who did not face Oklahoma Wesleyan in the regular season, was credited with four saves in the defeat. Avila's senior class: including Clark, Nugent, Lopez, Aubrey Chaney, Miriam Solorio and Amaris Sigler, wrapped up their collegiate careers with yet another postseason berth.

It truly has been an impressive run of consistency for Avila women's soccer, which exactly met its preseason prediction by finishing 8^th in the KCAC and qualifying for the postseason, something the team has now done in five of six years since the school has been part of the KCAC. Coach LaForge has made this program a postseason mainstay after famously inheriting a team that didn't win a game the year before she arrived. This year's senior class was extremely impactful, but with most of the huge influx of players that joined the team last year expected to return, the Eagles will shift their attention now to 2024 with sights set on more postseason success.