After the best season in the history of the program, the ISU soccer team had one of its worst.

Last Friday, the Cyclones finished one of its worst seasons in recent memory – a season in which the goals never came and the losses were either brutally close or just plain brutal.

Iowa State finished last in the Big 12 conference, with its worst conference record (2-8-0) since 1996, and missed the conference tournament for the first time in the past three years.

The team’s 6-14-0 campaign left players and coaches thinking of missed opportunities.

“We know we should have won a lot of games that we lost,” said junior forward Erin Witte. “But you can’t look back and say, ‘What if?’ You have to get it done while the time is there. Unfortunately, we didn’t.”

October held promise for the ISU soccer team. Three games into the conference season, the Cyclones sat at 2-1-0 in the Big 12, just under .500 overall.

A young team that had struggled at times, but had shown promise, went into the weekend of Oct. 6 facing an upstart, 11th-ranked Oklahoma State team and a winnable game against mediocre Oklahoma.

Brittanie Waddell scored 18 minutes into the Oklahoma State game, Stephanie Kaphingst added another goal in the second half, and as the clock ran down, Iowa State was poised for its second Big 12 upset.

But then it happened – Oklahoma State scored twice in the last seven minutes of the game and won in double-overtime.

The domino effect from that game was felt just two days later. Oklahoma beat up on a deflated ISU team, 4-0-0, the catalyst for the Cyclones dropping their final five games of the season.

“You look back and say, ‘What if this was different in this game or that was different in that game?'” said coach Rebecca Hornbacher. “Keeping a win against Oklahoma State . getting your points, it changes the momentum of a lot of things.”

Iowa State had up to eight freshmen in the starting lineup this season.

One of those freshman, forward Elise Reid, symbolized the Cyclone offense this season: fast, talented but unable to score. Reid, in particular, had an excruciating season, shooting 51 times but never scoring.

Iowa State had only 19 goals this season, an average of less than one a game, off 263 shots, providing little support for freshman goalkeeper Ann Gleason.

“It’s something that when you reflect back on the season, obviously you have to learn from it,” Hornbacher said.

“We will be able to take what we have been through this season, and it’s definitely going to motivate them for going out and getting back to where we want to be.”

Hornbacher said she is going to have a team meeting and get focused on next season. The team as a whole is young, with two seniors graduating, defender Kate Kirwan and midfielder Jess Villhauer.

“We have so much talent on this team, I mean, our possibilities are endless,” Witte said. “I know we are going to have an excellent season, and we’re not going to have to look back on what if or what we should have done.”