By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider
            If you grew up watching ABC's "Wide World of Sports," you remember host Jim McKay waxing eloquently about the "thrill of victory and the agony of defeat" in the intro of the Saturday afternoon TV show.
            Baylor soccer experienced both ends of the spectrum within a span of about 65 hours.
            After scoring two goals in the last three minutes of a 3-2 win over Kansas on Thursday, the Bears gave up a penalty-kick goal by Riley Baker with 18 seconds left in a heartbreaking 2-1 loss to Kansas State Sunday afternoon at Betty Lou Mays Field.
            "I thought we played well enough certainly to not lose in the last 30 seconds on what looked like a pretty questionable call to me," said first-year Baylor head coach Michelle Lenard, whose team fell to 3-7-2 overall and 1-3 in the Big 12. "I didn't think there was enough there to determine a game on that. So, that's frustrating. . . . But, I told the players, we don't want to be in that situation where the game can come down to a call in the last 30 seconds of the game."
            With the game seemingly headed to a 1-1 tie, the visiting Wildcats had a cross into the box that Baylor goalkeeper Lauren Traywick bobbled. Scrambling for the loose ball in a scrum just in front of the goal with Baylor defender Skye Leach and K-State's Kursten von Klahr, Traywick stumbled over the Wildcat player and was called for a yellow-card foul that resulted in the game-winning kick by Baker.
            Referee Victor Borges told Lenard that Traywick "went through (von Klahr's) back to get to the ball."
            "Which, it looked like a scrum to me," Lenard said. "The ball comes out, it's right there. The goalkeeper, the defender, their player, they're all right there in the same space. They all kind of trip over each other. We've had opportunities to have penalties in our favor that we weren't awarded, and that was way less clear than that.
            "(The ref) is in a better position than me . . but I feel with 30 seconds on the clock, it better be really, really clear to give a penalty on that. And that looked more like a tangled mess of bodies and legs than a clear penalty."
            Baker, who blasted in a first-half goal to give the Wildcats (5-7-2, 1-3-1) the early 1-0 lead, booted the penalty kick into the left corner of the net past a diving Traywick for the winning goal.
            "We have to get better at the counter attacks," Lenard said. "So many teams in this conference just win it and win it and hit the ball in behind. We know that, we're aware of that. And that can wear you down over time."
            Shut out in the first half, despite a 7-2 edge in corner kicks, Baylor got the equalizer in the 53^rd minute when Reneta Vargas headed in a goal off a cross from fellow freshman Hannah Augustyn. It was Vargas' third goal in the last two games and Augustyn's first-career assist.
            "We've known that she can score goals." Lenard said of Vargas, who missed the first eight games of the season with an ankle injury. "She's clever and smart and a great problem-solver and just has a nose for goals. It sure would have been nice to have had her all season, but now our priority is to keep her healthy, continue to get her fitter, and then hopefully put ourselves in position to be in the conference tournament, when she should be peaking."
            Baylor had four other shots on goal, two in each half, plus had shots by Ashley Merrill and Elizabeth Kooiman that glanced off the top crossbar. Traywick had seven saves, two shy of her career-high, including back-to-back shots by Baker just over 26 minutes into the second half.
            Baker's two goals were the first for the Wildcats since a 3-0 win over Colorado State on Sept. 15, getting shut out in their previous five games.
            "We needed to be sharper with the chances we did have," Lenard said. "Again, we controlled more of the ball, we were vulnerable in counter attacks. That's all they looked to do the whole game: win and kick it, win and kick it. But, we had chances. We were in the attacking third, and we lacked the execution in the box today that we had on Thursday. And when you do that, you end up in these tough situations that sometimes go that way."
            Going back on the road, Baylor will face Iowa State (3-7-3, 0-4-1) at 6 p.m. Thursday in Ames, Iowa, and then West Virginia (4-3-6, 1-0-3) at 2 p.m. CT Sunday in Morgantown.


WACO, Texas – Baylor soccer fell in the final seconds to Kansas State, 2-1, Sunday afternoon at Betty Lou Mays Field. 
 
The Bears who are now 3-7-2 on the season, 1-3-0 in conference play, scored the equalizer in the second half before narrowly falling to the Wildcats. 
 
THE RUNDOWN
Baylor started the match strong, with defender Ava Colberg putting a shot on frame in the second minute. By the fifth minute, Baylor had already taken two corners put weren't able to capitalize off of set pieces. 
 
Ashley Merrill lined up a shot in the 11^th minute that had potential but bounced off of the top woodwork. 
 
In total, Baylor took seven corners in the first half, creating chances but not able to find the back of the net on any of them. 
 
The Wildcats scored their first goal in the 30^th minute and held the 1-0 lead into halftime. 
 
After the break, Jenna Patterson lined up a good look, but the KSU goalkeeper made the stop. Elizabeth Kooiman also took a shot but it ricocheted off the crossbar. 
 
In the 53^rd minute, Reneta Vargas, who started in her second-straight game of the week was able to find the back of the net for the third time in two games. With an assist off of the boot of Hannah Augustyn, Vargas headed the ball into the back of the net and evened the score at 1-1. 
 
Goalkeeper Lauren Traywick tallied seven saves in the match, including three almost back-to-back-to-back saves in the second half, one in which she made a diving stop. 
 
BU only put one more shot on goal for the remainder of the game, as Maddie Algya and Micah Beasley each had shots that sailed just high of the net. 
 
The Wildcats scored their winning goal with 18 seconds left on the clock after a penalty in the box was called on the Bears and KSU lined up for a penalty kick. 
 
STAT OF THE MATCH

• Reneta Vargas scored her third-career goal in the match. She now was three goals in the last two games, to tie a team-high. 

 
 HIGHLIGHTS

• The Bears took nine corner kicks
• Lauren Traywick made seven saves, two shy of tying a career-high
• The Bears tallied 13 shots from 10 different Bears
• Five different Bears, Jenna Patterson, Reneta Vargas, Blythe Obar, Ava Colberg and Sarah Hornyak, each put shots on goal
• Three of Baylor's four defenders played all 90 minutes

 
QUOTABLE
Michelle Lenard on the game … 
"That's disappointing, for sure. For us to come out on Thursday and play the way that we did, and respond the way that we did going down. I thought we came out sluggish and tired, and maybe that's a little bit of carryover from Thursday, so much excitement and energy used in that game. Despite that, I thought we played well enough to certainly not lose in the last 30 seconds on what looked like a pretty questionable call to me. I didn't think there was enough there to determine a game on that. So, that's frustrating. And unfortunately, that's about all I can think about at the moment. I told the players, we don't want to be in that situation where the game can come down to a call in the last 30 seconds of the game. We needed to be sharper with the chances we did have. Again, controlled more of the ball, we were vulnerable in counter attacks. That's all they looked to do the whole game, win and kick it, win and kick it. But, we had chances, we were in the attacking third and we lacked the execution in the box today that we had on Thursday. And when you do that, sometimes you end up in these tough situations that sometimes go that way."
 
 
WHAT'S NEXT
The Bears will head on the road to face Iowa State Thursday, Oct. 13, in Ames, Iowa before heading to West Virginia to face the Mountaineers Sunday, Oct. 16.