The Park University women's soccer program has been playing some great team-focused soccer to begin the season, earning the win over Ottawa University on Saturday evening, 3-2.

Count it as the third straight season Park has been undefeated in non-conference play, which beforehand had not happened since 2001.

Park is now 3-0-1, while the Braves are 0-4-1. Head Coach of Park women's soccer Ken Hefner when brought up being undefeated in the non-conference schedule the last few seasons, immediately responded by saying, "but not like this, not like we are playing right now". He went on to point out the Park's 9-4 goal differential at this point in the season. Good insight from Coach Hefner, who is No. 4 on the NAIA's Active Women's Soccer Wins list at 329, after Saturday.

To Hefner's point, Park's been the aggressor in each of their four contests this season and in the last three games have taken over 20 shots and, on the flipside, have allowed less then 10 defensively.

It was scoreless through the first half of play, despite nine shots taken by Park and three on goal.

Patrycia Kozak and Elisah Miller are both new to Park this year and led the Pirates with four shots on goal each. Miller scored the first goal of her Pirate career in the 56^th minute igniting cheers from the crowd at Julian Field.

At the 59 minute mark, Cecilie Esbak Pedersen did some maneuvering around a Braves defender towards the left side of the box and delivered a dagger to the back of the net.

It was quickly coming together for Park in the second half, and the scoring was not done yet. Goals came soon after in the 65^th minute by Ottawa and again in the 66^th minute by Park.

 The Pirates third goal came from Mikayla Knipp, her second straight game with a goal. Knipp was fed a ball by Mackenzie Denham off of the corner kick. Denham elected to play it short, which gave Knipp plenty of space to work with. In her Pirate Post-Game, Knipp mentioned that it was a conversation in practice about the exact situation. She took the coaching and made an excellent play for the goal that was perfectly placed near the upper left post for the, eventual game-winning goal.

W??, Mikayla Knipp is a goal scorer in back-to-back matches and helped Park go undefeated in non-conference play! Listen to her conversation with play-by-play analyst @erikbergrud!
???https://t.co/2QT9ayBnz5 pic.twitter.com/s8I37Hbufi

— Park Pirates (@ParkPirates) September 10, 2023

The insurance goal would be huge, as Ottawa scored another goal in the 72^nd minute.

Park had plenty of firepower to work with, including 24 shots to only seven for Ottawa. It was a lot of shots, but impressively nearly have were on goal with 11.

Heart of America Athletic Conference play is here and the Pirates will face (RV) Missouri Valley at Julian Field on Saturday, September 16 at 5pm. Catch the next match here..

Box Score