BILLINGS, Mont. – In 2019, the Montana State University Billings women's soccer team narrowly missed qualifying for the Great Northwest Athletic Conference tournament, but they did mark vast improvement in almost every statistical category, had three players earn all-GNAC honors, and provided reasons for optimism heading into the long offseason.
 
The Yellowjackets notched a pair of landmark home wins, including a victory over defending conference champion Concordia 2-1. The team later bested Central Washington by the same score at Yellowjacket Field.
 
"Beating last year's regular season champions Concordia at home was important for us this year. For me the 2-1 win over Central Washington was the marquee matchup this year. We lost to them 4-0 last year in the same fixture to start conference play and we've really struggled against them since 2015, so that was a great victory. It was great to get those home wins and beat more than half the conference this year."
 
The Yellowjackets finished 6-9-2 overall, and took sixth place out of nine teams in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference with a record of 5-7-0. The team posted a winning home record of 4-3-1 and beat Saint Martin's 5-1 on the road to close out the fall on November 9.
 
"It was great to see the improvement from the season before," Cavallo said. "Last year, only winning one conference game was difficult and I thought we were a stronger team than our record showed. It was really about getting the team to continue to believe and fight for each other and then the results would come. This year, a lot of things came together well. We had a strong group of returning players led by our big group of seniors. We also added a lot of depth and skill with our new players. Our two junior college transfers helped a lot with their experience at different programs. The freshmen really stepped up as well. Kiley (Sandow) scored two goals for us and Kendall (Lossner) is going to be a very strong player for us in the future. Ally (Gockley) brought a lot as well."
 
The 2019 Yellowjackets were led by seven seniors including Kalin Sandow, Claire Tevaseu, Courteney Shovlin, Erin Reynolds, Alexa Iacolucci, Sahara Iverson, and captain Amanda Hemmen.
 
After two seasons of honorable mention selections, Hemmen earned second team all-GNAC honors this season and scored two goals and one assist for five points. Hemmen anchored the back row and started all 17 games with 1,498 total minutes. Another senior defender, Shovlin was instrumental in MSUB's success this season and had three points in 17 starts with 1,383 minutes played and 10 shots on goal.
 
 
Iacolucci returned to her sophomore season glory and again led the squad in points with 13 (four goals, five assists). Iacolucci's noticeable speed and skill translated into a team high 45 shot attempts in 1,429 minutes on the pitch. Shovlin and Iacolucci were both all-GNAC honorable mentions.
 
 
Reynolds started one game as a freshman and worked her way to being a top contributor this season. She scored her first career goal against Saint Martin's and finished with six points. Kalin Sandow started 16 games and recorded 1,206 minutes as a senior defender. Tevaseu had one assists and started 15 games for MSUB to finish out her four-year career. Iverson finished out her career with MSUB with 12 appearances.
 
"I'm really looking forward to working with our returning players next year," said Cavallo. "Obviously, we are going to miss the seniors that contributed so much to our program, but it's also an excellent opportunity for the returners to step out of the shadows and really take on the challenge. Our goal is to make the GNAC playoffs and we haven't gotten there yet, so we have to continue to work hard every day to get better."
 
Among returners, sophomore Haylee Gunter is perhaps the most intriguing. Gunter started all 17 games and took second in points with 10. Gunter tied with Iacolucci for the team lead in goals with four and landed eight shots on goal in 2019. Gunter will be joined by Julia Keller (seven points), and Lexie Bloyder (five points) as potential future leaders of the Yellowjackets.
 
As a team, MSUB was out-scored 34-22, for an average of 1.29-2.00 goals per game. The team landed 56-percent of its shots on goal and created 167 total shots (seven more than last season). The 'Jackets also recorded a 2-0 shutout over Minot State on September 17, a 1-0 shutout against Western Oregon on September 26, and a 1-0 shutout over Northwest Nazarene on October 12.
 
Junior goalkeeper Erinn Harder was responsible for four clean sheets and held a 1.73 goals against average and .639 save percentage with 46 total saves, a large improvement from the previous season. The 'Jackets other goalkeeper, Abby Hamilton is also expected to return after appearing in four games and making 11 total saves.
 
 
"I think more than anything the mentality of the team has helped us win," Cavallo said. "We talked about winning our home games and not letting the opposing team dictate the pace of the game and the physicality. We are the team that is on that field practicing hard every day through blood, sweat, and tears so we want to make sure we are rewarding ourselves in the game for that effort. Once you start to create that winning culture and midset that we don't lose at home, that is what you want to see."
 
Off the field, MSUB had a conference high 15 academic all-GNAC selections and Hemmen was also named CoSida academic all-district.