Well, it looks like the Eastern women’s soccer team picked the wrong time to hit an offensive snag in its game.

The Panthers haven’t scored a goal since Sept. 7, which already seems like forever ago.

Four straight shutouts isn’t the way the Panthers wanted to head into conference play, but I still see a little bit of upside to this whole thing.

If you go back and look at those four games, with the exception of the Butler game, all those games were 1-0 losses.

A loss is bad, of course, but a 1-0 loss isn’t too bad.

And that’s just looking at the final score. Look at those games a little deeper and you will see a different story.

During the Northern Illinois game at Lakeside Field, the first of the four shutouts, Northern scored just three minutes into the game, probably before most fans had even found their seats.

The second shutout was that Butler game that we won’t speak much of.

Three goals from Butler, two of them from Sophia Maccagnone, who is tied for first in goals scored in the Atlantic 10 conference.

Hey, things happen.

The Drake game was next, and the only goal came in the second half in the 68th minute.

Of the last four games, this one was probably the one the Panthers had the best shot to win.

They weren’t blown out in the shot column, as Drake only took a three more shots than they did.

Things just didn’t work out they way they were supposed to, and that’ll happen sometimes, too.

The most recent shutout, against Southern Illinois-Edwardsville, was again, 1-0, and the goal came, again, in the opening minutes of the game.

Do you see the pattern here? The Panthers are giving up costly goals from the get go and in turn, it’s costing them games.

This weekend they head to Jacksonville State, a team that has shutout more teams than anyone in the OVC, won more games than anyone in the OVC, and scored more goals than anyone in the OVC. Looks bleak, right? But hold the phone. Maybe not.

The Panthers have history on their side. Head coach Summer Perala has never lost to Jacksonville State.

Not only that, Jacksonville State has never scored on an Eastern team with Summer Perala on the sidelines. The Panthers are 3-0 against the Gamecocks under Perala, but it’s not just her.

The Panthers have outscored Jacksonville State 14-5 through the last 10 meetings, seven of those being shutouts.

I really believe this is the weekend they turn it around.

Jacksonville State might look a little better on paper, but if Eastern plays how its been playing the last 10 times it’s played the Gamecocks, they’ll win.

This is a big weekend for Eastern.

A win against the top OVC team, then carry that momentum over to a win over Tennessee Tech on Sunday, then bring it back home and win a few more and ride back into the OVC tournament? I like the sound of that.

Dominic Renzetti can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected].