After heartbreaking America East playoff losses to end its season the last two years, the No. 3-seeded Binghamton women’s soccer team at last closed out a playoff win in Vestal by beating No. 6 Vermont in the AE quarterfinals on Sunday afternoon. After 110 minutes of play, both sides found themselves knotted 0-0. Ultimately, victory for the Bearcats came down to the last penalty kick possible off the boot of senior forward Hannah Mimas, sending the squad to the AE semifinals.

“It’s great that we continue to keep our season rolling,” said Binghamton head coach Neel Bhattacharjee. “It’s fun when you can play at this point, playing these high-impact type of matches where it’s do or die and keep advancing. It’s wonderful that we got the result today for us to move on, and we’re certainly looking forward to trying to do more of the same come Thursday.”

To start the contest, Vermont received the kickoff and established ball control early on, but Binghamton’s backline kept them away from its third, setting the tone on defense early. While the game lingered at 0-0, both sides continued to generate opportunities. For the Catamounts, one such moment came in minute 15 with a breakaway look at the goal, but senior goalkeeper Kaitlyn Williams slid on the ball to keep it knotted. Binghamton got a strong look in the 34th minute, with Mimas coming within inches of a score, but Vermont’s keeper batted the ball out wide. The game remained scoreless heading into the half.

“[Vermont] had one other number in the back, so they had an extra defender versus what we saw a couple of weeks ago,” Bhattacharjee said. “It’s a departure from what Vermont normally does, and I think it was a move that certainly helped them. We were able to get a good amount of attack against them when we played them a couple weeks ago, whereas this time around it took a little bit more for us to break them down.”

The second period became defined by swings in attacking momentum between the Bearcats and the Catamounts. One of the most dangerous looks of the game came from the Catamounts in minute 56 from the left side of the box, but junior defender Brooke Herber got in front of it, and Williams scooped it up to prevent the score. Then, in the 61st minute, Mimas got a wide-open look from the left corner, but the ensuing shot rolled just to the right of the goal. Vermont got one more dangerous second-chance look after an attempted Williams save bounced back into play in minute 81, but Williams made her second grab stick. After 90 minutes had elapsed, the score read 0-0, and for the third year in a row, the AE playoffs were going to overtime in Vestal.

“It was a little bit dangerous when Vermont caught us in transition,” Bhattacharjee said. “We had to catch up, especially defensively. I thought we took care of those moments for the most part … Now they did have, no question, a couple very dangerous chances.”

The offensive deadlock carried into both overtime periods, and the burden of keeping Binghamton’s season alive rested on Williams’ shoulders. During the 95th minute of play, the Catamounts pressured the Bearcats’ third, but Williams scooped the ball up and cleared the sequence out. Then, in the final minute of the second overtime, a BU miscue gave Vermont a final look at the goal that Williams grabbed to save the game and send it to a shootout. Swapped out with sophomore goalkeeper Rebecca Kessler for the shootout, Williams left the game with seven saves in 110 minutes.

“One thing that we count on [Williams] to do is, in these types of games, [is] to make one or two big saves and she did that,” Bhattacharjee said.

Vermont started the shootout by getting its first look past Kessler to the left side, and a whiffed look from Herber cemented a 1-0 lead for the Catamounts going into the second round. From there, however, two straight saves from Kessler and goals by junior defender Allison Falvo and freshman midfielder Anna Buckwalter put BU up 2-1 in the shootout. After a Binghamton miss, however, the Catamounts knotted the shootout back up. With both sides one shot away from advancing, Kessler made back-to-back saves to keep things tied and give Mimas a chance to close out the game. With the season on the line, Mimas sank her shot to clinch the victory and send Binghamton to the AE semifinals for a date with UNH.

“It’ll be an interesting dynamic because our program scored the most goals of any team in conference play, and we’re playing UNH, who has given up the least amount of goals of any team in the conference,” Bhattacharjee said. “So you’re going to see those two things come to a head.”

No. 3 Binghamton will now visit No. 2 UNH on Thursday, Nov. 7 to take on the Wildcats in the AE semifinals. Kickoff is set for 6 p.m. at Wildcat Stadium in Durham, New Hampshire.