The UD women's soccer team lost 1-0 in the semifinal round to Saint Louis bringing an end to the 2005 season.

Seeded fourth out of six teams that made the tournament, the Flyers advanced with a win over St. Joseph's before their next match losing to the Saint Louis University Billikens.

In the first semifinal match the Rhode Island Rams defeated the Charlotte 49ers. This was the first match ever in which the Flyers met the Billikens. It is the Billikens first year in the conference, and they ended the Flyers' streak of seven straight A-10 regular season titles, taking the title for themselves, and halting the Flyers' championship run Friday night.

Early in the first half, Saint Louis scored their first goal on a fluke shot that sailed just over the reach of UD goalkeeper Niki Reed.

After the game, Coach Mike Tucker, said of the shot, '9 out of 10 times, Niki makes that play ' that ball just got caught in the lights.' It was a disappointing way for the game 's deciding goal to be scored.

Reed was able to redeem herself by making a save in the middle of traffic and a diving catch save. UD picked up on the defensive end, tightening up on the Billiken offense. UD had some scoring opportunities at the end of the first half, but was unable to convert any of them. The score going into halftime was 1-0.

As the second half opened, once again, the Flyers were not able to take advantage of many scoring opportunities, including a key moment when the ball was forced out of traffic and out to an open UD player who had an open shot but booted it high. Reed came up with another catching save on a bullet from far out. Later, there was a scramble in front of the Billiken goal where there were numerous players on the ground, but UD couldn't fight through the scramble and score.

The Flyers didn't score, and the score of 1-0 stood as the final, advancing the Billikens to the finals Sunday afternoon against the Rhode Island Rams.

'Saint Louis is a good defensive team' said Tucker. They have allowed no more than two goals all year.

'The tempo was difficult because it changed at times' Tucker added. 'Since we played last [Thursday] night, we needed to conserve energy. At times, we allowed Saint Louis to possess the ball in order to conserve energy.'

Tucker was hoping his defense could keep the game 0-0 in the first half so the offense could rest somewhat, and save energy for the second half. However, that plan had to be altered after the early goal.

As Tucker predicted, the game '[wasn't] going to be beautiful.'

Thursday night, the UD women's soccer team began their quest for the Atlantic-10 tournament championship by defeating Saint Joseph's 2-1 in a quarterfinal match.

The Flyers started off slow but picked up the pace late in the first half with two sensational stops by Goalkeeper Niki Reed and the first score of the game by Amanda Gallow for UD.

The score remained 1-0 until halftime, but the game was far from over. Reba Sedlacek scored the second goal for UD, making the score 2-0 and giving Dayton some breathing room. Saint Joes's came back with a corner kick that was knocked into the goal, but after that the Flyers were able to hold the Hawks in order to seal the victory and advance to the next round.

The UD loss to SLU was a very scrappy game indeed, and a tough loss for a UD team that finished the season 10-7-3.

UD will be losing a core of 8 seniors, including Alicija Bredlo and Reba Sedlacek, first team all-Atlantic 10 Conference selections. However many of the contributing players including Goalkeeper Niki Reed and Natalia Walters will be back for the 2006 season.