FARMVILLE, Va. – In a hard-fought game of few chances, two-time reigning Mid-American Conference champion Kent State took advantage of one more opportunity than Longwood.
 
Unfortunately for Longwood (6-4, 0-1 MAC), that opportunity came in sudden-death overtime.
 
Kent State forward Shannon Talbot drove home the golden goal in the 76th minute to lead the back-to-back MAC champion Golden Flashes (6-4, 1-0 MAC) to a 3-2 overtime win against the upset-minded Lancers Sunday afternoon in their conference opener at the Longwood Athletics Complex.
 
Talbot's game-winner came just over five minutes into the extra period to end a 75-minute battle that lasted beyond regulation thanks to a late equalizer from Longwood sophomore Leonie Verstraete just 1:29 before the end of regulation.
 
"To take a team like Kent State – back-to-back MAC champions, preseason favorite – to take them to overtime is progress for us," said head coach Iain Byers' whose 2016 Lancers are off to the program's best start of the Division I era. "Everyone on the team is obviously disappointed because we didn't win, but that's because they're a team that wants to win. You're super proud of that as a coach."
 
Longwood took the perennial MAC championship contender to the wire, jumping out to a 1-0 lead on a first-half goal from Verstraete and then overcoming a 2-1 deficit in buzzer-beating fashion when Verstraete drove in her second goal of the game – and 10th of the season – on a penalty corner.
 
It was the Golden Flashes who had the last word, however, as Talbot flicked in the overtime game-winner on a pass to the middle from Krysti Lober to end the 7-on-7 extra period. The shot was the second of only two in the overtime frame, both of which were on Longwood's net.
 
The game-winning assist was the second hero moment of the game for Lober, who put Kent State ahead 2-1 with a penalty corner goal in the 68th minute, just 62 seconds before Verstraete came through with the 69th-minute equalizer.
 
"It's tough. They're upset, but that's what you expect," Byers said. "We're going to come back stronger. We have a gameplan to beat them, and like I just said to the team, we'll see them again at tournament time."
 
The loss derails a three-game winning streak for the Lancers, who entered the MAC opener winners of four of their past six games. It marked the program's second one-goal loss in three all-time meetings against the powerhouse Golden Flashes, who are aiming for their third consecutive MAC regular season and tournament championships.
 
"We played an awesome game," said Longwood senior defender and lone team captain Ellen Ross. "We've shown how good we are this year, and this game proved that again. Overtime can be very unlucky. You have six people on the field, and whoever gets the breakaway wins the game. It could have gone either way.
 
"I think we deserved to win, but we lost. We learned so much from this game, especially from this one and [a 4-3 win at] Liberty. This is the hardest team we'll face the rest of the year, and we'll see them again in the MAC Championship. We have to play like this against every other conference team, and we'll come out on top."
 
The overtime win extended Kent State's conference winning streak to seven games, including the two-game sweep of last year's MAC Championship Tournament. The Golden Flashes defeated Ball State 3-1 in their 2016 conference opener on Sept. 23, so far making good on the three first-place votes they received in the MAC preseason poll and the second-place prediction that was just one point shy of first-place Miami.
 
"We've gotten through the meat of our season and we came out with a 6-3 record before we started conference play, which is good for us," Byers said. "We're gonna play a number of good teams in the MAC. It's a strong conference, and we know we can compete. Today showed we showed that."
 
Longwood will get a full week to prepare for its next matchup, an Oct. 2 showdown at non-conference foe Georgetown in Washington, D.C. That precedes a return to MAC play just five days later when the Lancers face the MAC's top preseason pick Miami on the road on Oct. 7.

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