KALAMAZOO, Mich. — Freshman goalkeeper Steven Tekesky made a career-high five saves but West Virginia fell 1-0 to No. 4 Western Michigan in the Mid-American Conference semifinals on Friday.
The fourth-seeded Mountaineers (9-6-4) now await Monday’s NCAA selection show to learn if their season continues. They last reached the NCAAs in 2011.
“Now, unfortunately, we leave everything in the NCAA Tournament committee’s hands,” WVU coach Marlon LeBlanc said. ” I think our body of work is pretty good — we haven’t lost a bad game this year. But a win would have put us in a better position. Now we have to sit on our hands and wait.”
The match was scoreless until the top-seeded Broncos (16-2-1) broke through in the 75th minute when Jay McIntosh scored from inside the 18 on a ball in that deflected to him off a WVU defender.
“I thought it was an ugly soccer game on both sides, and neither team really had very many good opportunities in the game,” LeBlanc said. “They had a scramble that led to their goal, where their kid did well to fight us off, and somehow it got in. It’s one of those things where we weren’t good enough on the day to win the game. I don’t think we deserved to lose it in the fashion that we lost it, but that’s soccer sometimes. We have to hold our head high and congratulate Western Michigan and wish them luck in the final.”
The Broncos advanced to face No. 7 Akron in the championship game on Sunday.
Western Michigan outshot WVU 20-3 and Broncos keeper Drew Shepherd made three saves.