Oakland University’s women’s soccer team won the Summit League championship title this past weekend beating 1st seeded South Dakota State Jackrabbits on Friday and 2nd seeded North Dakota State Bison on Sunday.

Oakland University hosted all three of the games of the Summit League tournament this past weekend.

The Golden Grizzlies started with a strong lead and never looked back in the first game against South Dakota State.

Within the first 6 minutes of the game, senior forward Meghan Reynolds provided the first and only goal of the game with a very strategic and smart assist from midfielder Shannon Doyle.

“We really needed that first goal,” said Reynolds. “It put us in the lead and our teamwork helped us keep South Dakota from scoring in the rest of the game.”

The Grizzlies attempted 10 different shots on the goal within the first half. Most of them were blocked by SDSU’s goalie Kat Donovan.

South Dakota wasn’t able to respond to the Grizzlies goal. They barely managed to keep the ball out of their side of the field and spent most of their time defending the goal.

They made a total of 4 shots in the first half, but they all came up short or were blocked by Oakland’s goalie Anne Berschbach.

The Jackrabbits began the second half stronger and managed to keep the ball mostly on Oakland’s side of the field. The first shot of the second half was from SDSU’s Kelly Ferguson at 50:26 and was saved by Berschbach.

Even though in the second half the ball was mostly on Oakland’s side of the field,

SDSU only managed to get 4 shots to end the lead of the grizzlies, but they came up short.

“We had some chances to get some more goals,” said coach Nick O’Shea, “but we hung on a lot in the second half.”

Oakland added 5 more shots toward the Jackrabbits goal but none of them were able to glide past Donovan.

The Grizzles won the first game of the tournament with an upset over South DakotaState with a score of 1-0.

“Everyone was really focused and trying their hardest and you could tell that we wanted the win.” Reynolds said. “Doyle and Berschbach really added to the game with great playes and great blocks.”

On Sunday, Oakland faced the North Dakota State Bison for the Summit League championship.

The Bison defeated the 3rd seeded UMKC Kangaroo’s 2-1 in the first round of the tournament. With 2 minutes left in the game, NDSU’s midfielder Danielle Boldenow scored the winning goal forcing the Kangaroos to end their season.

Oakland allowed NDSU 6 different shots on the goal within the first 35 minutes.

At 39:28 mark, the Bison were charged a foul and Oakland received a free kick.

Sophomore midfielder Julianne Boyle received the free kick and managed to score the first goal of the game. The ball soared over four different North Dakota State players and the outstretched arms of goalie Kalani Bertsch for the lead of 1-0.

“It was a really key goal,” said Kara Webber. “With the five minutes left it really helped move us confidently into the second half.”

Within the second half, Oakland worked even harder to keep the lead in the game.

In the first 6 minutes, Megan Reynolds came through again with another goal with an assist from Freshman Forward Kyla Kellermann to move the lead even further away from NDSU.

The Bison toughened up their defense, letting less plays come towards their goal.

NDSU started to work harder on their offence also, putting 6 more shot attempts on the board before they finally scored their first goal of the game.

NDSU’s Midfielder Michelle Gaffaney scored the header goal with an Aassist by forward Anisha Kinnarath very late in the game with 8 minutes left to spare in the game.

Oakland stayed strong to the end keeping shots from North Dakota to minimum.

OU had a lot of traffic toward their goal from the bison to the very end. NDSU pulled Bertsch out of the goal so they could keep the ball toward Oakland’s goal but they still came up short at the end of the game.

The Grizzlies won the final game of the tournament with a score of 2-1.

“It’s a great feeling to be back in the NCAA tournament,” O’Shea said. “It was defiantly a hard fought game and both teams didn’t give up. [South Dakota State fought hard but we didn’t let that stop us.”

Anne Berschbach, defensive player Kara Webber, and Juillian Boyle earned a place on the All-Tournament Team.

Megan Reynolds not only was awarded a spot on the all tournament team but was honored as the Most Valuable Player of the entire tournament.

“Megan Reynolds never stops working,” O’Shea said. “Sometimes forwards only work when they have the ball. She is non-stop with and without the ball and she deserves it.”

This is the seventh Summit League Championship for the Oakland women’s soccer team and it will be their sixth trip to the NCAA tournament, which starts this Friday.