Northern Michigan University’s Hannah Kastamo, left, works to get the ball around Saginaw Valley State’s Morgan Bogacki during the GLIAC Tournament championship game in women’s soccer played against Saginaw Valley State at the NMU Soccer Field in Marquette on Sunday, Nov. 17, 2024. (Photo courtesy Cara Kamps)

By Journal Sports Staff

MARQUETTE — Fans of the Northern Michigan University women’s soccer team won’t be so lucky this year after the Wildcats found out they won’t get to stay home to open the Midwest Region of the NCAA Division II national tournament later this week.

Last year, NMU won both the GLIAC regular-season and tournament championships, prompting the NCAA seeding committee to give the Wildcats a No. 2 seeding and a pair of home games to open the nationals.

Despite repeating those achievements with regular-season and tourney titles in the past week or so, the NCAA only gave the Wildcats a No. 4 seed this time around in the same Midwest Region when tourney pairings were announced on Monday evening.

That means that Northern (14-3-4) has to travel from the start, and it won’t be a short distance, either.

Now playing in its third consecutive NCAA tournament, NMU goes to Ashland, Ohio, to face off against No. 5 seed Drury (14-2-4) at 3 p.m. Friday, with the winner to face the host and No. 1-seeded Eagles at 3 p.m. Sunday.

While Northern locked up the GLIAC’s automatic bid as its tournament winner, Drury earned an at-large spot after losing in the Great Lakes Valley Conference tourney semifinals to McKendree.

Interestingly, the NCAA doesn’t fill up the tourney bracket with a capacity 64 teams, similar to what would be seen in an NCAA Division I basketball bracket.

Instead, the national group only gave out 56 invitations, meaning eight of the highest-seeded teams get a first-round bye, which includes Ashland.

The seven-team Midwest Region also includes GLIAC regular-season runner-up Grand Valley State as the No. 3 seed as the Lakers have a slightly better regional ranking than NMU, based on all games.

GVSU takes on No. 6 Missouri-St. Louis in that half of the bracket in St. Louis on Friday morning. The other Midwest first-round game, also in St. Louis, pits No. 2 Maryville (Missouri) against No. 7 McKendree on Friday afternoon. Maryville is considered host of that half of the bracket as the No. 2 seed.

The winners of Friday’s games in St. Louis play at 2 p.m. EST Sunday back in that city, with the Sunday winner facing the NMU-Drury-Ashland winner the following weekend, likely back in Ashland, Ohio.

This lineup of Midwest Region teams includes the pair from the GLIAC, the Wildcats and Grand Valley, four from the GLVC and one from the Great Midwest Athletic Conference.

NMU and Drury have never played before, while Ashland is a much more familiar foe as the Eagles were once members of the GLIAC. In fact, the last time Northern and Ashland squared off was in now Northern veteran coach Jon Sandoval’s first season at the helm when the Wildcats won 1-0 in the GLIAC tourney semifinals.

Information compiled by Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.