STEUBENVILLE, Ohio – Lady Baron soccer improved to 3-1 on the season with a deceptively close 4-1 victory over Thiel College. The FUS women scored three goals in the final seven minutes to turn what would've been a frustrating tie into blowout win.

"It makes us hopeful. It makes us really hopeful because our goal is to make it to playoffs," head coach Clare McBane said of her team's record, which is just one win shy of the programs win total for the entire 2012 season. "I think it gives the girls the confidence they need to hopefully meet our goals."

Franciscan started off the game with sophomore forward Hannah Cooke scoring her first goal of an eventual hat trick in the eighth minute. Despite overwhelming possession, FUS struggled to convert scoring chances into goals after giving up the game-tying goal in the fifty-second minute.

With just seven minutes left in the game, Cooke struck again with a strong finish into the top right corner of the net. Less than a minute and a half after the she took a cross from the right side of the field and took a skillful touch that put the ball over the oncoming keeper into the net.

"She consistently works for balls and she does not give up. Her first touch is phenomenal," McBane said of Cooke. "She's in the right place at the right time and she's very talented."

Less than two minutes after Cooke completed the hat trick, sophomore midfielder Lauren Stearman completed an aggressive run down the wing with a goal that put the game well out of the Tomcat's reach.

"We made some crazy position switches trying to prepare for the conference season," McBane said. "In the first half they were still working on, in the second half they were getting better and better, and right at the end we finished it."

McBane said part of the team's adjustments and eventual success came from a change in the midfield as the team tried to adjust to the absence of injured starting center-mid Julia Cocozza. To help strengthen the team's passing, last year's leading scorer Ashley Ruttencutter was moved from the wing to center-mid and paired with sophomore Calene Dougherty.

"Something that we're really missing so far this season is good distributing balls in center. Ruttencutter has always been good as distributing," McBane said. "So we realized that moving Ruttencutter would help. Sometimes she gets caught up in the top and Calene is very defensive minded."

The moves eventually paid off and gave the team their second 3-1 start in program history.

Things get harder from here for the Lady Barons as they get about 24 hours to prepare for an away game against Muskingum University at 7 pm.