 "Photo: David Heasley")
After upsetting No. 24 Minnesota last Sunday, the Ohio State women's soccer team takes to the road this weekend to play their last two games against Big Ten opponents.
OSU (6-7-2, 3-5-0 Big Ten) plays Northwestern at 3 p.m. today in Evanston, Ill., and then heads north Sunday to take on the Badgers of Wisconsin at 1 p.m. in Madison.
"Coming off a win is great," junior co-captain Emily Francis said. "It was kind of a must win for us."
Francis said the Buckeyes would like to end the Big Ten season at the .500 mark, a place that they have not seen all year in conference play.
"We definitely want to end the season at .500," Francis said. "These are two very beatable teams."
Walker said that OSU stacks up pretty well against Northwestern and Wisconsin, giving them a shot at winning this weekend.
"Both teams are going to play out of a 4-4-2 and that allows us to play out of a 3-4-3 and that gives us good numbers in the attacking end," Walker said. "Wisconsin has a really strong midfield and Northwestern has been scoring a ton of goals but also have been conceding a lot goals. We need to prevent them from scoring and, like always, you got to score more."
Northwestern is OSU's first test this weekend. The Wildcats are 8-7-1 overall and 1-6-1 in the Big Ten. Northwestern had two games last weekend, coming out with a 1-0 win Friday against Indiana and 2-1 loss against Purdue in double overtime. The Wildcats are scoring 1.75 goals per game, good for fourth in the conference, while they are allowing 1.88 goals per game in conference games.
"Northwestern has been scoring a lot of goals, so I think they will be a handful for our defense, but they also have been giving up of a lot of goals," Francis said. "If our backline comes ready to play and our frontline starts scoring some goals this weekend it will be great."
Sunday, OSU will take on Wisconsin, who is 6-8-2 overall and 1-6-1 in Big Ten play. The Badgers are coming off a two-loss weekend where they lost to Purdue 1-0 Friday and then lost Sunday to Indiana by the score of 2-1. Like OSU, Wisconsin will play two games this week, its first coming Thursday night against Wisconsin-Green Bay.
"Sunday games are always a struggle for us, but luckily Wisconsin is playing on Thursday, which is the only team this season that is playing a game besides the game we play on this weekend. Usually all the teams take the day off," Francis said. "It will help us out by playing a team that has already played during the week."
Walker said these two games are must wins for OSU and will play a factor in qualifying for the Big Ten tournament. The Buckeyes sit in seventh in the conference, needing just one tie on the weekend to qualify for the eight-team tournament.
"Wisconsin or Northwestern are not going to make this about playing Ohio State. They have to get wins in order to qualify for the tournament and we have to get wins to qualify for the tournament," Walker said. "I think that everybody is going to be focused on what part of it they have control of and do as well as they can.
Milestones could be reached this weekend as well. With two wins this weekend Walker would reach the 100-win mark in her ninth season as the Buckeyes' coach. Also, freshman forward Lisa Collison can tie and possibly pass fellow Buckeye forward Lara Dickenmann in goals for a season. Collison, the leading freshman scorer in the Big Ten, has 11 goals on the season, leaving her two goals shy of the record Dickenmann set last season.
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