DENTON, Texas – With conference tournament seeding on the line and the excitement of senior day, Texas Woman's rallied from two goals down to salvage a 3-3 tie with Midwestern State Sunday afternoon, ending the Pioneers' five-game winning streak and dropping them to third place in the Lone Star Conference.
 
Sophomore Haley Ward set the tone for the first half, taking two consecutive shots in the first two minutes but getting blocked on both by MSU defenders. Ward would account for two more of the Pioneers' 14 shots in the period, but only junior Hannah Schneider and sophomore Jazmine Navarro could get shots on goal. Freshman Jazmine Maxwell made two saves for the Pioneers, preventing the Mustangs (2-12-3, 1-9-2 Lone Star) from making it on the board and ending the half, 0-0.

"I know, at least for us, we had those offensive leads to score in the first half, we just didn't put the ball away," TWU head coach Babak Abouzar said. "We kind of took some plays off and that gave them the opportunity to capitalize, and when that happened we woke up and realized we need to take advantage of our chances."

TWU (10-5-3, 7-2-3 Lone Star) continued to pummel the MSU goal with shots in the second half.  But the Mustangs turned back each attempt, then countered with speed in the transitions. MSU's Madison Williams broke the stalemate at 52:15 when she tapped in the ball off a cross, ending Maxwell's six-game shutout streak.
 
With that first goal, the scoreboard started to light up. Freshman Riley Sutton took a corner kick that rebounded off an MSU defender and came to senior Allie Chapman whose rebuttal was a 20-yard rocket into the upper right corner at 57:42 that evened the score at one.
 
Midwestern (2-12-3, 1-9-2 LSC) didn't back down and in a span of 3.5 minutes, the Mustangs scored two more goals that stymied the Pioneers. At 62:25, it was Williams again driving MSU. Maxwell made the initial save on her hard shot which Kelly Cannistra finished inside the box.  Still on the offensive, Midwestern earned a corner kick that Micah Wilson headed in at 65:46 to out the Mustangs up, 3-1.

"We just took this game for granted," Abouzar said. "We were sitting second [in the conference standings] and thought things were going to get handed to us, so we got content and it took us getting scored on three times to finally wake up and understand that we need to perform."

With less than 20 minutes left in regulation, TWU closed the gap when Schneider took a pass from junior Maddi Nolton and outpaced the Mustang keeper one-on-one with a blast into the lower left corner at 73:57. Now down only 2-3, there was renewed urgency in getting the ball into the offensive third. It was Ward who landed the equalizer for the Pioneers at 88:37, receiving the rebound from a blocked shot by senior Libby Murphy, and notching her eleventh goal for the season. 
 
The deadlock continued into overtime, and although TWU got off six shots to MSU's one, none found the back of the net and the game ended in a 3-3 draw. The tie extends TWU's unbeaten streak to a school-record seven games.

"Credit to our team for being resilient and not giving up, I think that was huge for us," Abouzar said. "That mentality was spot-on in terms of fighting back, and we just need to continue having that mentality." 

Ward and Schneider took charge of the Pioneers' offense, taking nine and eight shots, respectively. Maxwell logged the entire 110 minutes along with two of her defensive line, senior Brittany Jones and freshman Maddy Harper.  
 
TWU totaled a season-high 36 shots in the game, ten on goal, to the Mustangs' 14, eight on goal. The three-goal output matched two other times this year that the Pioneers scored three goals in a game, both 3-0 wins in regulation.
 
With the tie, TWU was forced to wait for the result of the Angelo State at Eastern New Mexico match. ASU defeated ENMU, 1-0, which elevated them into second place and the first-round bye. TWU, which previously finished in third in 2009 and 2015, ends the regular slate with 24 points to ASU's 25. 
 
The third-seed Pioneers will host their first-ever conference tournament match on Wednesday at 7 p.m., ironically facing the sixth-seed Midwestern State Mustangs once again in Pioneer Soccer Park.