The field hockey team took one step toward first place in theMAC and one step back over the weekend.
The Cardinals (8-10, 5-4 MAC) beat conference leader Kent State3-1 on Friday, but lost the second to last place Ohio Saturday. Theloss eliminated Ball State from a possible No. 1 seed in the MACtournament.
Heading into the game, head coach Annette Payne said her teamneeded to play hard from the start to beat Kent State (8-9, 6-2).Payne got her wish as the Cardinals scored all three goals in thefirst 20 minutes.
The game featured the top two goal scorers in the MAC: BallState senior Afton Hess and Kent State senior Jennifer Melnyk. Eachscored a goal, but Hess had the advantage in overall points with anassist.
Hess' goal started the scoring for the Cardinals 2:33 into thegame. Junior Jen Strodel and freshman Lindsay Quay added goals inthe first half.
Ball State outshot the Golden Flashes 12-7.
The Cardinals traveled to Ohio (6-10, 4-4) and lost 2-1 inovertime Saturday. The loss put Ball State a game and a half behindKent State in the MAC with one game to play.
Ohio scored first, five minutes into the contest. Hess answeredwith a goal 15 minutes later that tied the score at one. The scorestayed the same for the final 50 minutes of regulation as the gamewent to overtime.
The Bobcats won the coin toss and got the ball first inovertime. They took the ball from midfield to the circle and scoredthe game-winning goal 17 seconds into the extra period.
The Cardinals head to Central Michigan Friday for their finalregular season game. Though they can no longer get the top seed inthe MAC tournament, they can still capture the No. 2 seed.
The MAC tournament starts Nov. 7 at Kent State.
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