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| 2011 Regular season: CC 2, CSB 1 |
| 2011 Championship: CSB 1, CC 0 (OT) |
| 2012 Regular Season: CC 2, CSB 1 (2OT) |

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Today (Oct. 31), the fourth-seeded Saint Benedict soccer team will travel to Moorhead, Minn. to take on top-seeded Concordia in a first round matchup of the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) postseason tournament.

This will be the fourth time in the past two years the Blazers and Cobbers have met, and the second straight year they have met in the postseason, giving this matchup all the makings of a great rivalry. The match features the MIAC's best team this year in Concordia - a team that won the conference regular season crown by a whopping 10 points - versus Saint Benedict, last year's conference regular season co-champions and postseason champions.

The Cobbers will undoubtedly have last year's matchups on their mind going into today's game. In the 2011 regular season finale, the Cobbers met the Blazers in Moorhead, fighting to keep their postseason hopes alive, while the Blazers were fighting to secure the MIAC regular season crown. The Cobbers used an early goal from MIAC Co-MVP Sarah Rounds and a late goal by midfielder Laura Prosinski to topple the Blazers 2-1, and earn themselves the third seed for the tournament. That hard-fought game may have been what set fire to this rivalry. Cobber players Gina Weiss and Nikole Koehn both received yellow cards in the second half.

That intense loss set the stage for an emotional conference championship, this time to be played at the Blazers' home field in St. Joseph. This game was not any easier on the officiating crew than the last one. The game featured an astounding 22 fouls, split evenly 11 and 11 between the two squads. To put this in perspective, 11 is almost twice the amount of fouls the Blazers have averaged per game this season (6). The game went scoreless for the first 90 minutes, sending the championship match into a dramatic overtime.  With only five seconds left in the first overtime period, then-sophomore defender Kerri Dingman rocketed in the golden goal, winning the conference championship for the Blazers and sending the Cobbers home empty-handed.

Last Saturday, the teams met once again in the regular season finale. This time the Blazers were the ones that needed a win to secure a playoff spot. The Blazers came out strong, getting a goal from Colleen Bouchard just eight minutes into the first half. The Cobbers responded with a goal of their own just 20 minutes later, equalizing the score at one goal apiece. Neither team was able to score for the rest of regulation, sending the teams into another exciting overtime finish. In a roller-coaster sequence of events, the Blazers nearly won it with a shot off the foot of Bouchard. Unfortunately, Cobber goalkeeper Ali Nelson made an incredible diving save to keep her team alive. Minutes later on the other end of the field, sophomore Elizabath Robinson booted in the game-winning goal for the Cobbers, ending the match 2-1 in Concordia's favor.

Today's game promises to feature the same high intensity that these teams have become accustomed too. Although Concordia appears to be the easy pick on paper, they will not be underestimating a Blazer attack that rifled off 25 shots last Saturday while holding the Cobbers to a 15. Big players to watch in this game will be last year's MIAC Co-MVPs, Bouchard and Rounds. Of late, the Blazers have been able to keep Rounds under control. In the past three matches Rounds has managed only one goal with no assists. Bouchard has one assist and one goal in those three matches.

If the Blazers are going to win and keep their NCAA tournament hopes alive, they will need to limit the number of scoring opportunities they give to Weiss and Rounds, just as they did last Saturday. They will also need to balance out their own scoring chances among players other than Bouchard and First-year Alyssa Hoffman, as the Cobbers will likely game plan to lock down the best forward combination in the MIAC.