The University of Mary women's soccer team gets a second chance against Minnesota-Duluth.

This is one opportunity the U-Mary Marauders don't plan to let slip away. U-Mary (10-9-1) plays host to the Bulldogs (7-10-2) today at 4 p.m. in the first round of the Northern Sun tournament.

Minnesota-Duluth defeated the Marauders 2-1 in overtime on Oct. 18.

"We have to control the midfield,"U-Mary coach Levi Evans said. "I thought Duluth owned the midfield against us last time. When we did get to the midfield, they were blowing it, destroying it or getting it out of there quickly."

But U-Mary was without one of its best players. Midfielder Jess Janusz, a St. Mary's alumnus, missed the game to interview for optometry school in Oregon. Janusz leads the Marauders in points with 25 on eight goals and nine assists.

"It's a good chance for our team to make up for that loss,"said Janusz, a senior. "It sucks that I had to miss that game, but it was for stuff beyond soccer. I'm glad I can help my team try to get that one back."

Evans is hoping that Janusz's return will help alleviate some of the problems in the midfield.

"You never want to have to lean on players,"he said. "It gave our team an opportunity to look at other girls. Hindsight is a beautiful thing because if we didn't have Jess this game, we would play differently. Part of it is, we played the same style, but we tried to plug players into Jess' role, and it didn't work. That's my fault as a coach. You have to be able to take a look at what you have. You have to adjust to the personnel you have."

U-Mary secured a home playoff game by earning the No. 4 seed in the NSIC. Minnesota-Duluth enters postseason as the No. 5 seed.

After dropping a contest to Upper Iowa on Friday, U-Mary rebounded to tie Winona State 1-1 on Sunday. In some ways, it was a victory for U-Mary because Winona State is ranked No. 1 in the North Central Region.

"Winona wanted an unblemished conference season, and it was their Senior Day,"Evans said. "We needed to get that taste out of our mouth from the Upper Iowa game. I thought it was a pretty important game just to get you set in the right direction for the playoffs."

Evans said Minnesota-Duluth's greatest strength is its goalkeeping and defense. The Bulldogs rank fifth in the NSIC with 20 goals allowed for 1.05 per game. U-Mary is eighth with 26 goals allowed for an average of 1.30.

U-Mary will start Carly Feiler in the net. The junior from Pierre, S.D., has recorded 52 saves for an average of 1.02 goals per game this season.

Evans and Janusz both see the advantage of hosting a home game.

"The men's players are coming out to support us," Janusz said. "Having fans there to support us, we can be home, we can get our school work taken care of and then get ready to play. That's a huge advantage. We've had our ups and downs as a whole, but we're putting our best out there."

The Marauders are 7-1 at the Bowl this season.

"The team is starting to realize that this could be probably our last home game," Evans said. "You never want to play your last game at home. If I'm going to lose, and my career is done, I'd rather be somewhere else."