COMMERCE– The Texas A&M University-Commerce will face Texas Woman's on the road Wednesday. The Lions defeated the Pioneers 3-2 at home on Sept. 27.
 
WHO: Texas A&M-Commerce (8-2-2, 4-2-0 LSC) at Texas Woman's (4-6-2, 1-4-1 LSC)
WHERE: TWU Soccer Field in Denton, Texas
WHEN: Wednesday, Oct. 11 at 7 p.m.
LIVE STATS: Click HERE
LIVE VIDEO: portal.stretchinternet.com/twupioneers/
 
The Lions are coming off two conference wins over the weekend. A&M-Commerce defeated conference-leader Angelo State 3-0 on Friday and UT Permian Basin 3-0 on Sunday.
 
"In the game against Angelo, they are at the top of the league," said head coach Neil Piper. "We played pretty well and got a win against them. And then struggled a little against UT Permian Basin but finally put them away. It was a big six points to get us back in the race."
 
With the six points from the two wins, the Lions are in second place in the conference with 12 points at the midway mark of the season. The Lions trail ASU by one point. Piper is pleased with how his team has performed so far and knows if they can take of their own business, they are in a good spot to win the conference championship.
 
"Our first goal is to make the NCAA Tournament," Piper said. "We want to win a championship and you can't do that unless you are in the tournament. And secondly is to do as well as we can in conference. We are starting the second half of the season now and we are one point behind. We control our own destiny, which is good."
 
At the halfway point of the season, Piper now knows the type of team he has. While the team has multiple freshmen who play a large amount of minutes, Piper knows that with half a season under their belts, inexperience is no longer an issue for his young team.
 
"The difference is miles," he said of his team's development over the first half of the season. "At the beginning of the season, we were good. We were young and inexperienced. We made some mistakes. We weren't quite sure what we had. But we have a pretty good rotation now.
 
"We are starting five freshmen and two sophomores every game. It might not always be the same five freshmen. We have had so many tough games, inexperience is not an excuse anymore. They know what it takes to win tough games. Hopefully that pays off in the last six."
 
The Lions will now face TWU, who lost to A&M-Commerce 3-2 in their matchup in Commerce two weeks ago. After falling behind 1-0 at halftime, the Lions regrouped to score three goals in a row to take control of the game.
 
"That first half was not very good," Piper said about the TWU game. "I'm not quite sure how else to say it. Texas Woman's had something to do with that, but our players just weren't ready for the game. We had a little chat at halftime and we made a couple of adjustments tactically and obviously in the second half we played much better."