The Eastern men’s soccer team will open the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament as the No. 6 seed against Missouri State, the No. 3 seed, at 5 p.m. Wednesday.

Eastern lost to the Bears 1-0 in overtime on Nov. 1, as the Panthers played a good match according to Eastern head coach Adam Howarth.

“It’s a good draw. We played well against them last time we played them,” Howarth said. “Hopefully we will repeat our last match and we learned something, so we can snatch a victory.”

Sophomore forward Alex Harrison said he did not think it mattered who Eastern drew in the first round.

“We have played well the last couple of weeks and have made a massive improvement,” Harrison said. “We have seen all the sides in the conference and there are some good sides, so it really didn’t matter who we play.”

Junior forward Evan Philpott said he does not even look at the seedings for the tournament.

“Everyone’s goal in the tournament is to win every game and make it to the NCAA Tournament,” Philpott said. “Every team is going to be out flying around and playing high speed.”

The other match on Wednesday will pit the No. 4 seed Evansville against No. 5 seed Bradley at 7:30 p.m. Top-seeded and regular season conference champion Creighton will play the winner of the Evansville-Bradley match, while No. 2 seed Drake will play the winner of Eastern-Missouri State.

Both matches will take place on Friday with times yet to be determined. The championship match will take place on Sunday at 1:05 p.m. with the match being broadcast on FSN Midwest.

The winner of the tournament receives an automatic berth to the NCAA College Cup.

A top two seed has received the automatic berth in 16 of the last 17 years.

Eastern torches defense

In Eastern’s 5-3 loss on Saturday against the National Soccer Association of America’s No. 2 team in the country Creighton, the Panthers did something most teams have had a problem with all this season: score goals on the Bluejays.

Creighton entered the match having only allowed four goals in the previous 14 matches so far this season.

They also entered the game with a 0.30 goals against average.

Phillpott said the Panthers did a number of things to keep the Bluejays off balance.

“We were getting the ball out wide and did a good job with our crosses,” Philpott said. “We were just going at them and playing aggressive.”

Howarth said he was not surprised by his team’s offensive output because he said he always knew his team was capable of scoring goals.

“We have two potent forwards who are very good,” Howarth said of Harrison and senior forward Brad Peters. “We had some good energy, and hopefully we can bring it again against Missouri State.”

Short road trip for Eastern

The Panthers will travel on the day of their match against Missouri State because the trip to Evansville, Ind., is approximately a three-hour drive. Last season, Eastern had to travel all the way to Creighton in Omaha, Neb., for its first round match.

Philpott said he likes traveling the day of the match because it gives less time to overthink.

“Soccer is a simple game when you think about it,” Phillpott said. “So when we get there, we will be ready to go.”

Dan Cusack can be reached at 581-7944 or at dscusack@eiu,edu.