Season Review: Women’s Soccer secures 20th straight winning season in 2023

By Wes Mayberry

ADA — Despite facing an extremely difficult schedule in 2023, the Ohio Northern women's soccer team posted its 20th consecutive winning season and 18th straight upper-division finish in the Ohio Athletic Conference.

Led by first-year head coach Ben Tierney, the Polar Bears finished with a 10-9-1 overall record and were 7-2-0 in the OAC for a third-place finish in the league standings. Along the way, they played five games against teams that were ranked in the final United Soccer Coaches Top 25 Poll, including No. 5 Christopher Newport (Va.), No. 8 John Carroll, No. 16 Case Western Reserve, No. 18 Hardin-Simmons (Tex.) and No. 19 Carnegie Mellon (Pa.) and another team that received votes in the poll in Mary Hardin-Baylor (Tex.).

The difficult non-conference slate helped prepare the Polar Bears for OAC play, and they closed the regular season with a four-game win streak against Wilmington, Muskingum, Baldwin Wallace and Marietta by a combined score of 10-2.

As the No. 3 seed in the OAC Tournament, ONU advanced to the championship game for the eighth straight year via a 1-0 win over sixth-seeded Wilmington in the quarterfinals and a 2-0 victory at second-seeded Otterbein in the semifinals. Junior Alyssa Beckett (Monroe) scored what proved to be the game-winning goal against Wilmington in the 14th minute of that game, and junior Julia Flanagan (Dublin/Watterson) and senior Alaina Casey (Beavercreek/Carroll) added first-half goals in the victory over Otterbein. A stout ONU defense and freshman goalkeeper Morgan Moeller (Harrison/Roger Bacon) spearheaded the shutouts.

Northern proceeded to fall 2-1 at top-seeded John Carroll in the tournament finals, which brought its 2023 season to a close.

The Polar Bears finished the year with five All-OAC honorees in Beckett, seniors Bri Straus (Fishers, Ind./Hamilton Southeastern) and Jill Roberts (Bellbrook/Carroll), junior Emma Bowman (Novi, Mich./Northville) and sophomore Haley Cannon (Oregon/Clay). Beckett and Straus were First Team selections, Bowman and Cannon were named to the Second Team, and Roberts was a Third Team pick.

Beckett, the 2022 OAC Midfielder of the Year, is now a three-time All-OAC First Team honoree. She scored a team-high four goals to go with one assist and ranked second on the team with nine points in 19 games, including 15 starts, in 2023 and was named to the All-OAC Tournament Team.

She has played in 59 games with 54 starts in her ONU career and has 37 points on 16 goals and five assists.

Straus capped her senior season with the fourth All-OAC accolade of her career. She started all 20 games in 2023 and led a Polar Bear defense that limited opponents to just 4.1 shots on goal and 1.05 goals per game while tallying seven shutouts.

Straus has started all 73 games she has played in her ONU career and has six points on two goals and two assists to her credit.

A back-to-back All-OAC Second Team selection, Bowman ranked second on the team and seventh in the OAC with five assists in 2023 after posting a team-best nine assists as a sophomore. She added one goal this season, giving her seven points in 20 games with 19 starts, and was an All-OAC Tournament Team selection.

Bowman has 24 points on three goals and 18 assists in 61 career games with 60 starts. Her assist total is three shy of breaking into ONU's all-time top 10 in that category.

Cannon led ONU in points (12) and assists (6) and tied for second on the team with three goals in 2023.

After playing in 12 matches off the bench as a freshman, Cannon proved to be a spark for the Polar Bear offense this season, playing in 18 games with 11 starts. Her assist total ranked sixth in the OAC.

Roberts closed the year with five points on two goals and one assist in 15 games, including 10 starts. Both goals were game-winners.

Now a four-time All-OAC honoree, she has 36 points on 14 goals and eight assists in 69 career games with 64 starts.

Other top performers from 2023 included Moeller, Flanagan, senior Emma Cook (Marysville/Fairbanks) and junior Elizabeth Pierce (Liberty Township/Mount Notre Dame).

Moeller posted a solid freshman campaign in goal, starting all 20 games and tallying 60 saves and seven shutouts with a 1.06 GAA and .741 save percentage. Her GAA ranked fourth in the OAC.

Pierce finished with seven points on two goals and three assists while Cook and Flanagan tallied three goals apiece. Flanagan joined Beckett and Bowman on the All-OAC Tournament Team.

Other Polar Bears who played in 15-plus games in 2023 included Casey, senior Kate Helton (Beavercreek), juniors Alexa Clampitt (Sterling Heights, Mich./Utica Academy for International Studies), Libby Johnson (Fairfield), Chandler Clark (Lima/Bath), Jill Newlan (Marshalville/Smithville) and Jess Gast (Perrysburg) and sophomores Kiera Kaeser (Ashland), Rileigh Glassburn (Delaware/Olentangy Berlin) and Claire Wiseman (Cincinnati/Saint Ursula Academy).

Several Polar Bears were also standouts in the classroom, as the team earned six College Sports Communicators Academic All-District honors and a program-record 17 Academic All-OAC accolades, which was tops in the conference.

Straus, Bowman, Clampitt, Johnson, Cannon and Wiseman earned Academic All-District distinction and joined Casey, Roberts, Clark, Gast, Newlan, Pierce, Glassburn, Kaeser, senior Kylie Cabana (Dexter, Mich.) and sophomores Nora Metcalf (Herndon, Va.) and Lindsey Pawlawski (Baden, Pa./North Catholic) as Academic All-OAC honorees.