Eastern wins Big Sky soccer title on shootout, 2-1

PAUL DELANEY, Staff Reporter | Last updated Nov 10, 2016 1:46pm0

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Eastern Washington keeper Mallory Taylor is all smiles while NAU's Ali Lixandru is dealing with missing the deciding penalty kick in Sunday's Big Sky championship game. EWU earned a 2-1 win and a berth in the NCAA tournament. They play USC Saturday in Los Angeles.

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For the longest time, in fact all game in last Sunday's Big Sky Conference championship, Northern Arizona could not get a shot anywhere near the goal guarded by Eastern Washington's Mallory Taylor.

And when it really counted, in a shootout that followed a pair of 10-minute scoreless overtimes, the Lumberjacks still missed their opportunity again as a penalty-kick from Ali Lixandru sailed wide and to the right.

The miss was Eastern Washington's reward in a 2-1 win and sent No. 5 seed Eastern on to its first-ever NCAA soccer tournament where they will travel to Los Angeles and face the Universit...