The Ohio Valley Conference Tournament’s championship game wasn’t as it was supposed to be with only a matter of three minutes remaining.

Eastern, defending their OVC championship for the third year in a row, was losing to the Samford Bulldogs by the score of 2-1.

The Panthers had been battling back against the number one seeded Bulldog squad all day on Sunday, but the Panthers’ emotion had taken over some of the players since Samford’s go-ahead goal was scored.

“When their second goal was scored, I looked around and definitely saw some tears in a few players’ eyes,” junior forward Sharyne Connell said. “The whole game was just so draining emotionally and physically.

“Firstly, because they are such a good team we knew it was going to be tough. But after they went ahead I thought the team was going to be emotionally drained.”

The opposite ended up happening in the end, however, after the Panthers fought to keep the game at a one-goal margin.

Then, finally, the 87th minute struck and all the passion and intensity the team had hung on to throughout the season came out in a brief, unexpected and nearly unbelievable flurry that took the Panthers over the top.

First came junior defender Morgan Frerick’s goal to tie the game and then Connell won the game and the tournament less than two minutes later, with no regard to those who might not have turned their head back around after Frericks’ goal.

“I, and this team, wanted this game to end right there, the faster the better,” Eastern coach Steve Ballard said. “We thought we had the upper hand going into the game and, even though we had to come back, this team was not going to be denied.”

The Panthers, themselves didn’t allow the situation to hold them captive as many teams are prone to do. The pressure of the situation, with only a few minutes left to tick away the entire season, would have caused so many teams to be crippled. But this year’s Eastern squad, like so many others in the past, didn’t allow that to overcome what their mindset needed to be.

“We weren’t thinking about anything more than ‘holy crap, we better score another goal’,” Connell said. “We knew we just had to keep fighting, and then the goals happened, and it was due to everyone out on the field; it was a complete team effort.”

After the game concluded, some members of the team struggled to grasp exactly what the victory meant but they knew it was special.

To Morgan Frericks the game was considered to be “one of the highest comeback games I’ve ever been involved with.”

“I’ve never been involved in a game where there has been so much on the line,” she said. “When you look at all the ups and downs of the season, then you get to this point together as a team, everybody is going through all the emotions right now.”

Going through all those emotions is something Ballard did not want to come back down from and he wanted his players to relish the moment.

“I don’t want to think about anything else right now, the selection show (for the NCAA College Cup) or anything,” Ballard said. “We still have an ultimate goal of winning a game at the NCAA tournament, but we still will just enjoy the trip back home for right now.”