Box Score BOX SCORE

OLYMPIA, Wash. – The Southern Oregon soccer team pulled within one win of its first Cascade Collegiate Conference championship Saturday afternoon, defeating Evergreen 4-1 at Evergreen Pitch.

With the win, SOU improves to 11-5-1 overall and 7-1 in conference play. Evergreen falls to 4-9-1 overall and 2-6 in the CCC. Southern Oregon closes out the regular season on Monday, when the Raiders will play at Northwest at 3 p.m. with home-field advantage in a CCC Tournament match on the line.

“A really good result for us,” SOU head coach Jon Clement said. “It's always good to go on the road and win, and this is a difficult place to get wins. I'm really glad for our team, and we're really excited about the chance to play for a conference championship on Monday.”

The Raiders got on the board early, as Kennedy Roteman (Yorba Linda, Calif./Esperanza) scored in the 16th minute to put SOU up 1-0. Just over two minutes later, Stephanie Carr (Upland, Calif./Upland) knocked in her team-high 10th goal of the season to make it a two-goal lead for the visitors.

Evergreen's Sophie Krauza pulled the Geoducks to within one just seconds before halftime, scoring in the 45th minute to make it a 2-1 match. The Raiders outshot ESC 7-2 in the opening period.

Denise Powell (Grants Pass, Ore./Hidden Valley) pushed the lead back to two for SOU with a goal six minutes into the second half and later added her second goal of the match to reach the final score of 4-1.

“It demanded a different type of soccer from us today, conditions were less than ideal so it was difficult to get into the rhythm we like to play in,” Clement. “I'm really proud of our team, they adjusted so well and really caused the other team a lot of problems and created a lot of attacking chances.”