EWU women complete undefeated Big Sky soccer season

Eastern Washington completed an undefeated Big Sky Conference regular season with a sweep of road game last weekend, clinching both first place and the host role in next week's league tournament.

The Eagles clinched first place on Friday, Oct. 20 with a combination of their 4-2 win at Idaho State and Portland State's 1-0 loss to North Dakota. Eastern followed that with a 2-1 win at Weber State last Sunday.

EWU improves to 14-4-1 overall with an undefeated 8-0-1 conference mark, setting a new program record for wins in a single season. The Eagles are unbeaten in 11 games, the best in program history and also marks the longest unbeaten streak in Big Sky competition for the Eagles, nine games.

After trailing 1-0 at the half, Chloe Williams netted two second-half goals to lead the Eagles to victory, the final coming in the 79th minute. Goalkeeper Emily Busselman was in net for the Eagles, had one save and improves to 14-1-1 overall.

"Today was just an overall gritty win for us and it's nice to see that we can go down in a game and respond with effort and get a result," head coach Chad Bodnar said. "I'm very proud of our group as we keep growing in different areas this season."

Friday, Eastern got goals from Williams, Devan Talley,Jenny Chavez and Saige Lyons. Williams' goal was the 40th of her career as she became the Big Sky's All-Time leader in goals. The previous record was held by Amanda Ellsworth (2011-14) from Idaho State.

The Eagles will close out the regular season on the road at Idaho on Oct. 27 at 7 p.m.

The Big Sky Conference Championship is set for Nov. 1-5 in Cheney at the EWU Soccer Field. Since EWU clinched home field advantage, they will have a bye in the first round and have its first game of the tournament on Friday, Nov. 3.