By Kalle Oakes,Staff Writer

LEWISTON – The Bates College women’s soccer team survived and thrived throughout last weekend’s New England Small College Athletic Conference tournament, so it’s hard to imagine the Bobcats being intimidated by their next stop: the NCAA Division III nationals.

Seeded fifth in arguably the region’s most loaded league, Bates won at Williams, beat Bowdoin on a neutral field and trimmed top-seeded Tufts on its home turf in the championship game.

Nobody is underestimating Little East Conference champion Eastern Connecticut State University, whom Bates will confront in a first-round regional game Saturday in Somerville, Mass. But you won’t find any player quaking in her cleats, either.

“This is the most inspired I’ve felt about post-season play in my four years,” said co-captain Jenna Benson, a forward from Watertown, Mass., and one of only two seniors on the squad. “There’s just a feeling on this team.”

It’s a feeling Bates (13-3-1) hasn’t experienced in eight years, since the last time the Bobcats scrawled their name into the NCAA bracket. Colby eliminated Bates that season.

One autumn earlier, in 1996, Bates advanced all the way to the Elite Eight.

“Women’s soccer has changed dramatically since then,” said Bates coach Jim Murphy, who coaches both the soccer team and the nationally ranked women’s basketball program and spent his week juggling afternoon and evening practices. “It’s so much better.”

This is Bates’ fourth trip to the NCAA tourney. While marching to the national quarterfinals in ’96, the Bobcats faced three consecutive NESCAC opponents.

Allowing just under a goal per game, Bates went 5-3-1 in the league this season and 5-0 in non-conference games prior to clinching an automatic NCAA bid and tying the school record for most wins in a season.

“There are no upsets in women’s soccer in NESCAC. It’s just that tough,” Murphy said. “It probably has been several years since we’ve lost a non-conference game, and I don’t think we are alone. It prepares you for games like the one we’re going to play Saturday.”

Bates placed three players on the all-conference team announced this week: junior forward Kim Alexander of Cumberland (12 goals, three assists); two-sport standout Meg Coffin (six goals); and sophomore Molly Wagner (five goals, eight assists).

Jessie Gargiulo fashioned eight goals for the Bobcats, while freshman Jen Marino scored four, including the tally in double-overtime that topped Tufts, 2-1.

Senior co-captain Sara Abbott directs the defense along with Becky Macdonald, Jen Pflanz and goalkeeper Nini Spalding (five shutouts).

Coffin is questionable for the tournament due to back spasms, but Bates overcame a variety of missed-time injuries in becoming the first women’s program in school history to win a NESCAC title.

“Coach says all the time that it takes all 25 of us to accomplish this, from the starters to the bench to the people who don’t see any time,” Abbott said.

The seniors credit a combination of toughness and skill, mixed with a collective sense of humor, for Bates’ success.

Benson also reserves high marks for Murphy, who has never guided the Bobcats to a sub-.500 season in his lengthy tenure.

“He’s the best coach I’ve ever had,” she said, “and his ability to motivate is completely invaluable to this institution. Any coach can say, Go get ’em,’ but we know he believes in us.”

Tufts beat Bates during the regular season and will host the sub-regional as the top seed, by virtue of NCAA computer rankings. Bates or Eastern Connecticut will meet the Tufts-Johnson & Wales winner on Sunday.

Since a one-goal loss at Williams on Oct. 8, Bates is 7-0-1.

“We typically have a lull in the middle of every season and work our way through it,” Abbott said. “For us as seniors, we go in (Saturday) thinking, OK, this could be our last game. How do want to spend our last 90 minutes on the field with some of our favorite people in the world?'”