The Pirates of East Carolina had the Golden Eagles under control, holding them to only seven shots in the game but the Golden Eagles prevailed, 1-0.

“Some of it has to be contributed to East Carolina,” coach Markus Roeders said. “Their style is a little bit different than ours so you have two styles. We weren’t as efficient in our attack especially. They had some dangerous chances.

“We’re still waiting for the game when everything falls into place. We’re playing our game for 90 minutes, we score three or four goals and I’m not to say that should have happened today, but I thought for long stretches we did not look to get more opportunities.”

Senior midfielder Anne Ioder scored the winning and lone goal of the game, her second of the season. At the 31st minute she scored the open goal on an assist from senior Laura Culhane after East Carolina goalkeeper Lindsi Troxler came out of her position.

“I think individually I’ve been able to step up and start scoring,” Ioder said. “Now, I’ve got my confidence up. I think as a team we’ve been stepping up because we were getting a little desperate, realizing that we might not be in the conference tournament this year. We realized we’ve got to start scoring goals.

“It starts with, on the team, with each person saying to themselves ‘I have to step up this game.'”

Despite playing an irregular Marquette game, the team is still excited with the result.

“I think a sign of a good team, which I think we are, is that they can have a bad game and still win,” associate coach Frank Pelaez said.

Ioder interpreted her coach’s words that a good team can have a bad game and still win to the progress of her team.

“We are the best team in conference, but the problem is we have lost to teams we are better than and I think you always have to play on your top to win no matter who you are playing,” she said. “The best team can lose.”

Ioder said the team has put those times behind them.

“It was a realization with this year, losing to Tulane and TCU, that we were the better team obviously and we lost,” she said. “We realized we had to keep playing the entire game and keep fighting.”

The team had the fighting spirit Friday when they were able to come from behind to defeat the Charlotte 49ers, 3-2. Marquette scored three goals in the final 31 minutes. Freshman Beth McGill scored her third goal of the season in the 72nd minute from eight yards out. McGill had a hand in Marquette’s next goal 10 minutes later on an assist to fellow freshman Ashley George, who scored her second goal of the season from 10 yards out.

The deciding goal was made by senior midfielder Kristen Jensen in overtime, as she was able to score on a free kick from 17 yards out. Marquette recorded a season-high 12 shots on goal.

“We played close to a perfect match, only we allowed two goals,” Roeders said. “If we would have won that game 3-0 in regulation, I would have said that we were playing at our top level at this point in time. It might have been close to maybe the best game we’ve played. But then you look at the circumstances of having to come back from being down, 2-0.

With the win over East Carolina, Roeders said the Golden Eagles are back on track for their run at the conference tournament.

“With the win today, I think we qualified for the conference tournament, which was one of our goals,” he said. “We have enough points that no matter what happens from then and now we’re in it.”

The Golden Eagles’ next match is 2 p.m. Friday at DePaul.