JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (Oct. 4, 2015) â€" Amy Long put the Buffs on top early on, Vanessa Quinones doubled the lead in the second half, and the Milligan College women's soccer team came away with a 2-0 win over Point University in Appalachian Athletic Conference action Sunday afternoon at Science Hill High School.
 
Milligan improved to 3-6-1 (2-2-1 AAC) and broke a three-game stretch of league games decided by a single goal. Milligan also broke Point's (5-6, 3-2 AAC) five-match winning streak and was the first team to score against the Skyhawks in the last two weeks.
 
Long scored the match-winner in the fifth minute with an assist to Keri Harrison when Harrison played a pass across the face of the goal to an open Long at the far post. Long finished with one touch straight into the back of the net for her team-leading fourth goal of her freshman season.
 
Quinones' goal was the first of her career and essentially put the game out of reach in the 51st minute, scoring nearly the same amount of time into the second half as Long did into the first. This time, Brittany Davis played a ball back to Quinones who launched a shot from the right side at the top of the penalty area, over Point goalkeeper Natalie Brown, and into the back of the net.
 
Milligan had a quality chance to increase the lead again in the 69th minute when Long dribbled through the Point defense and took a shot that rebounded off Brown. Callie West gathered the loose ball and took another shot, saved with one hand by Brown, still to be rebounded by Long once again. Long's second attempt during that sequence was also saved over the crossbar for a corner kick.
 
Point, which outshot the Buffs 21-6 but only 7-6 on shots on goal, did not go without its chances. In the 12th minute, Celly Ruiz fired a shot from distance that required Charlotte Stephens to parry it off the crossbar for the second of seven saves on the afternoon.
 
Later into the second half, Stephens denied Hailey Plemons' free kick which was awarded on the 18-yard line directly in front of the goal. Plemons fired a rocket that Stephens punched back into play and Skyhawk midfielder Erin Elmore put her head on the rebound only to have it saved once again by Stephens.  
 
For Stephens, Sunday marked her fifth straight game with seven or more saves and brought her to 61 on the season. She currently ranks second in the AAC in the saves category.
 
Milligan will be on the road for the next game, facing league frontrunner Columbia College (8-2, 2-0 AAC) on Wednesday, Oct. 7. The next home match will be the following Wednesday, Oct. 14, against Bluefield College in the penultimate home match of the regular season.