Men’s Soccer and Women’s Cross Country SLIAC Champions, Coach Marshall Coach of the Year

The Westminster athletic department had a successful Saturday afternoon as the Women’s Cross Country team and Men’s Soccer team clinched the 2013 St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SLIAC) Titles. The Women’s cross country coach, Jim Marshall, was named SLIAC Coach of the Year after Saturday’s first place victory. This is the first time Coach Marshall has been named Coach of the Year since becoming Westminster’s Head Coach in 2012.

The Women’s Cross Country team owned the SLIAC Championship 6K race on Saturday afternoon in Hillsboro, Illinois, finishing in first by a landslide. They tallied 47 points, with the next lowest point total of 75. This marks the program’s first ever SLIAC Championship. The Blue Jays placed four runners in the top 10 with their five timed runners averaging 23:39. Sarah Koestner paced Westminster with a time of 22:51 and finished 4th overall. Sarah Ogar finished 6th with a time of 23:31, while Brier Skogsberg and Lilly Willis took 9th and 10th just three seconds apart. Koestner and Ogar were named to the SLIAC All-Conference First Team, and Skogsberg and Willis were named to the All-Conference Second Team.

The men’s soccer team clinched first place in the SLIAC with the 1-0 victory over Eureka on Saturday. They finished the regular season with an 8-1 SLIAC record. The 3-way SLIAC tie between Westminster, Fontbonne and Webster for first place was settled by the quality of wins index which knocked Webster to third place, followed by the head-to-head match up between Fontbonne and Westminster in the regular season, which Westminster won 2-1 in overtime. This is the second time in the last three years the Blue Jays have clinched first place. The Blue Jays will host #4 Greenville for the Semifinal round on Wednesday at 7:00 p.m. If they win on Wednesday, they will host the winner of the other Semifinal round (Fontbonne vs. Webster) on Friday, November 8 at 7:00 p.m.