Holy Names women soccer has been named the Cal Pac champion after regular season winner William Jessup forfeited two league contests following their discovery of an administrative error. HNU's record is now 11-8-0 overall, 9-1-0 in conference action. The Hawks advance to play #6 Concordia (Ore.) in the NAIA national tournament on Nov. 21 in Portland.

"While the conference is disappointed for the William Jessup team, we continue to be impressed with the character and integrity the institution exhibited in this situation," said Cal Pac commissioner Don Ott. "It was WJU's own due diligence that exposed the error, and in the best examples of Champions of Character and in representation of the tenets of their university, they took the correct actions."

Ott further praised the Holy Names women for their championship. "The Hawks are an excellent side, a championship team," he said. "HNU goes to the nationals for the first time, and they will be excellent representatives of the conference. We wish them all the best."

Both the HNU men's and women's teams are in the NAIA soccer championships.

WJU's situation involved a computer glitch that failed to assign a yellow card received in the season's very first match to one of their players. As a result, the coaches and student-athlete played throughout the season with an erroneous understanding of the number of cards being accumulated. Per soccer rule, a player who accumulates five yellow cards must sit out the next contest. Since the statistics showed only four cards, while in fact she possessed five, the player participated in a contest against Menlo College, a WJU victory, on Nov. 7. She also played in the regular season finale, a tie with Holy Names, on Nov. 10. Both contests, per NAIA rule, must be forfeited for use of an ineligible player.

As a result of the two forfeits, WJU's overall record is adjusted to 9-5-2 overall, 7-2-1 in Cal Pac. Menlo College's record also changes to 8-9-1 and 6-3-1.

The Cal Pac and the NAIA conducted extensive conversations on Monday, Nov. 16, to ascertain the correct disposition of the situation. Two national committees, the National Eligibility Committee and the National Administrative Committee, reviewed the situation and determined the course of action along with the cooperation of the conference and the involved institutions.