CALEB RIORDAN | Reporter
The Lions snatched their second win of the season in a 1-0 shutout Sunday afternoon against Missouri S&T.
Lindenwood came into the game with momentum, as it secured a strong 4-0 win over Drury at home Friday night.
There was a scoreless first half for both sides, where the scoring chances were hard to come by for Lindenwood, and the Miners were having a difficult time capitalizing on theirs. Morgan Weller had the only real chance for Lindenwood in the half, ripping a shot wide in the 21st minute. Missouri S&T’s best chance came off of a huge cross from Mikaela Mockenhaupt, where there was a brief scramble in the box, and eventually ended with a shot skied over the net.
The Lions made no real threats to get on the board.
“The first half, we weren’t doing the little things right,” head coach Dave Musso said. “We weren’t winning head balls, we weren’t connecting passes. The first 10 minutes of the game we kept finding our forwards and they kept giving it away.”
The Lions were outshot 6-5 in the first half, with none of their shots being on goal.
Right from the start of the second half, Lindenwood came out with an aggressive attack.
With just over five minutes off the clock in the second half, Olivia Callipari made a 20-yard run down the left side and put it past the Miners’ goalie for the only goal of the game for either side.
After that, it was all about defense for the Lions.
“What we try to do is be very organized and don’t let them get the easy goal or get in on us,” Musso said. “They grinded today and found a way to win.”
The pesky defense of the Lions gave up nothing easy to the Miners the entire game.
Lindenwood’s goalkeeper Megan Swanson gets her first win of the season, while making 7 saves, with 6 coming in the second half. It was big stop after big stop for Swanson, making her final and biggest save in the final 20 seconds of the game.
“She did really well,” Musso said. “We got some good goalies that are really going to help us. She was just on every ball, every breakdown, it was huge.”
After a big two victory weekend, the Lions hope to carry their momentum into their 7 p.m. match against Missouri Western State at home this Friday.
