The Central Christian College women's soccer team kicked off the new school year with a 0-0 draw against theTabor College Blue Jays. The Lady Tigers have a different look this season after losing four year standouts Caitin Hartzell, Audra (Pruter) Rostine, and Beth Schimke from last year's squad. Coach Reimer has added some new freshmen and a couple of junior college transfers to the mix and shifted people around to make up for the loss of personnel from last season. This year's team overall is smaller but quicker.

This first game was a real test for the Lady Tigers. CCC spent the first half chasing the Blue Jays around the field, fighting the wind. With the wind at their backs in the 2nd half Central gained new life. Late in the half with Tabor beginning to fade, the Lady Tigers poured it on and had a couple of solid looks at the net. Unfortunately their chances were thwarted by the Tabor keeper.

After two scoreless halves, the teams headed into overtime. The teams played for twenty more minutes but neither team could find the back of the net and the game ended with the score tied 0-0. With all the shuffling of personnel it was unclear how the Lady Tigers would react to the changes. Several players stepped up and had a big impact. Jr. Whitney Chappell, who for two years has spent the majority of her time on the pitch near the opponent's goal, has accepted a defensive role this season keeping the opponent's strikers from scoring. She did a great job today shutting down a couple talented Blue Jay strikers. Freshmen Stephanie Street and Libby Anderson both played very smart in the midfield, helping to generate some offense. With Chappell off the front line, the job of forward fell to Jr. transfer Kim Rodriguez. Going up against players twice her size, she played tough all game. Her hard work led to the best scoring chance late in the second half off a great cross from Stephanie Street. Sr. goal keeper Leah Stringer was huge for the Lady Tigers in goal. She came up with 7 saves for the game, two of which were really impressive.

Coach Reimer said, "I was very pleased with our effort for all 120 minutes. We really worked hard the whole game. Leah came up big for us today. Hopefully when we get forward Kris Trammell back from injury we can turn the corner offensively."

CCC gets 6 days off before their next home game against Sterling next Tuesday.