The Oakland University women’s soccer team fell 2-0 to Western Michigan Sunday night in the regular season home opener. The team’s poor performance left many unanswered questions for Grizzly fans in attendance and for head coach Nick O’Shea.

The game was the first of three this season played at the Ultimate Soccer Arena in Pontiac.

Sophomore netminder Shannon Coley returned from injury to make her first start since the season opener, a 3-0 loss to Michigan State. True freshman Whitney Sarkis had been starting in Coley’s place for the past three games, with a 2-1 record.

Western Michigan got on the scoreboard early in the game when Nikolette Rivera scored a goal on a second chance rebound in the ninth minute.

In the second half, Coley gave up another rebound in front of the net that WMU’s Jackie Drees knocked into the goal to put Oakland at a two-goal deficit from which they would never recover.

O’Shea did not seem to be overly concerned with the question of who will be starting the bulk of the games this season. “They are both good goalkeepers. Shannon gave up a bad goal today,” O’Shea said. “But we have not come to any decision as to who our goalkeeper will be.”

Following Western’s second goal, Sarkis began warming up on the sidelines, but Coley remained in the net for the rest of the game.

O’Shea’s bigger postgame criticisms were concentrated on the performance of his field players, specifically the offense.

“Nobody wants to take any shots or make anything happen themselves,” he said. “Every player wants to pass the ball to someone else and have that person make something happen. There is no drive, no intensity, and that is one of the problems with having a young team, nobody wants to do anything themselves.”

Oakland did not have a quality scoring chance until late in the second half when sophomore Deanna Colarossi had two shots hit the crossbar and the goalpost within a few seconds of each other.

O’Shea attributed the lack of a sustained offensive attack to his team’s sub-par intensity.

“I have forwards that do not want to shoot the ball, they want to pass it and have someone else shoot it,” he said.

Despite being shutout, the Grizzlies outshot their opponent 7-4.

This was the second consecutive game that Oakland has been kept off the scoreboard.

With the loss, Oakland dropped to 2-3 for the season. In its next match, the team will take on the University of Michigan Wednesday in Ann Arbor.

Photo by BOB KNOSKA/The Oakland Post