SEATTLE — The Western Oregon soccer team's best season in nearly two decades came to an end on Thursday night when they fell 4-1 to the Seattle Pacific Falcons in the semifinals of the Great Northwest Athletic Conference Championships at Interbay Stadium.

The Wolves and Falcons split their two regular season meetings, with both teams defending home turf. In their most recent matchup before the GNAC Championships, Seattle Pacific escaped with a 2-1 double overtime win, scoring the golden goal with just three minutes left to play.

Seattle Pacific utilized a big first half of scoring to earn their trip to the championship game against Western Washington. The Falcons scored three of their goals before the break, first striking 23 minutes in. Chloe Gellhaus nailed the longest goal of the night from 24 yards out when her laser off the boot tucked inside the upper left corner. It was Gellhaus' seventh goal of the season.

SPU waited just five more minutes before finding net again, this time on a penalty kick by Claire Neder.

The Falcons paced the attack in the first half, out-shooting the Wolves 14-7. They held a 10-1 advantage in shots on goal in the game.

Leading 3-0 coming out of the half, the Falcons extended that lead to four with Sophia Chilczuk's eighth goal of the year, yet the second half would be played evenly with each side scoring one goal.

It took until the 80^th minute for junior Malia Napoleon to net her first collegiate goal and get Western Oregon on the board. Isabelle Creighton crossed a pass into the box that Napoleon pushed on a header just out of reach of SPU keeper Riley Travis.

"This was not the result we wanted tonight, but this team definitely fought for 90 minutes," said Western Oregon head coach Kacey Bingham. "We thought we had a great start and were unlucky on a few of our attempts. We made a lot of changes going into the second half and we really adapted well."

The four goals allowed was the most given up by Western Oregon since Oct. 12, and only the second time this season they have allowed more than two goals to an opponent.
Alyssa Tomasini led WOU with six shots on Thursday. Danielle VanOrd backed her up with another three. Napoleon's goal would be the only shot that came on target.

Western Oregon closed the season 10-6-3 overall and 7-3-2 in conference play. It was the most overall wins for the Wolves since the 2002 season and their most conference wins since then as well.

Offensively, WOU posted one of their best seasons during their NCAA era, finishing inside of the program's top four single seasons in every major offensive category. That included totaling 26 assists, the third-most during the Wolves' time in the NCAA.

Alyssa Tomasini finished the year as the conference leader in both goals (9) and points (25) while also leading the Wolves in assists (7). Her 25 points this season is the most by a WOU player since Mariel Chandler in 2001. She also had the most goals for the program since 2008 and the most assists since 2002.

For six Western seniors, it was their final game in a WOU uniform, helping solidify a season to be remembered in Monmouth.

Kaili Brundage, Kaitlin Poe, Isabelle Creighton, Jacky Beristain and Selene Konyn combined for 17 goals this year and all had multiple scores in their final collegiate seasons. Keeper Alex Qualls started all 19 of WOU's games this season, recording the second-most shutouts in the conference with six.

 "It was a great season and I want to acknowledge the seniors again for their efforts," added Bingham. "Congratulations and good luck to SPU and WWU on Saturday."

The Wolves have now completed their 2019 season.