SOUTH EUCLID, Ohio – The Notre Dame College women's soccer team was in search of their first victory and first goal of the 2021 campaign. In an offensive outpour, the Falcons defeated Fairmont State 3-1 on a warm and sunny afternoon at Mueller Field. The win moves NDC to 1-1-1 and drops FSU to 1-2.
 
The first action on offense came in the 12^th minute when Kalie Blaising struck a ball to the top right corner, calling on FSU's Taylor Kennedy to make a great save, which she did. A pair of Fairmont State shots would come in response requiring Jordan Pasalaqua to make a diving save to her left in the 16^th minute.
 
A flurry of shots by Sammy Salatino in the in the 20^th, 21^st and 24^th minutes pressured the Fighting Falcons defense. Salatino's 24^th minute shot found the back of the net off of the Blaising corner to give Notre Dame their first lead of the season.
 
"It was good to see some smiling faces [after the goal]," Shiels said. "When you play well, but don't get goals, it can get frustrating so it was good to get that goal and move forward."

The goal scoring monkey has been lifted off the back of every NDC player as the team saw season highs in shots, shots on goal, and goals scored.
 
In the second half Louisa Follert netted her first and second career collegiate goals. Follert was the spark plug to the Falcon offense that Head Coach Mike Shiels was waiting for. On a booted ball from Pasalaqua, the freshman out ran the entire FSU defense to burry the ball in the back of the net with her right foot. After a Fairmont State goal in the 76^th minute, Follert would answer only three minutes later by converting a penalty kick, drawn by Salatino in the box.

"It was great," Follert said, talking about her two goals. "I was here last [spring], but didn't get to play. I finally scored for the Falcons and I'm glad."
 
In total, NDC ripped 14 shots with ten coming on goal. FSU registered 12 saves and five on goal in a solid effort from the road team. Pasalaqua allowed one goal and tallied four saves, while FSU's Kennedy collected seven saves but allowed three goals as she was under fire all afternoon. NDC dominated in corner kicks with six to the opponent's one. Moreover, FSU received the only cautions of the match with 68^th and 83^rd minute yellow cards on their head coach Kernell Borneo and Kiera Kuzinski, respectively.

"I was really happy," Shiels said. "We thought in our last game, as the game went on we started to play a little bit better. Today... we had a lot of good chances, which was not quite the case the other day, and felt like we were able to do some things that we wanted to do from this past week."
 
Notre Dame College will be back in action on Wednesday Sept. 22 at 7 p.m. when they travel to Wheeling to battle the Cardinals.