OMAHA, Neb. – Fewer than three minutes from an unsatisfying tie, College of Saint Mary found some late-game magic to walk off a winner.

In the 88^th minute, Abby Ostergaard found Devon Koyle down the right side. Koyle whistled one to the far post to a waiting Citlali Prado, and Prado redirected it in to give the Flames a dramatic 2-1 Great Plains Athletic Conference victory over Briar Cliff University at the CSM soccer complex.

Playing without two players responsible for 12 of the team's 17 goals on the season entering the day, and struggling to generate opportunities in the second half, the Flames found a way to get their desired result.

"You never know what a goal's going to come off of,'' CSM Coach Jamison Parkhill said. "Devon put in a really good ball on the back side, and (Citlali) was there to put it in. We needed these three points. The fact that we got those three points and it not being pretty is massive.''

Prado's first goal as a Flame allowed CSM to improve to 4-9-0 overall and to square its GPAC record at 3-3-0, while pushing its conference point total to nine. BCU dropped to 3-9-1 and 1-4-1.

College of Saint Mary opened the scoring in the 11^th minute when Izzie Kadavy had the ball on the left wing and found Bella Knudtson, who punched in her first collegiate goal.

"Great opening goal,'' Parkhill said. "We had to find different goal scorers, as opposed to either Bella (Olsen) or Ella (Klusman). The fact that we had two different goal scorers, both being assisted, was huge.''

After the Chargers tied it in the 67^th minute on Ellen Lofsjogard's goal, a draw appeared quite possible. But the Flames kept searching until they found the game-winning strike.

"We got it done,'' Parkhill said. "It wasn't pretty. We had stretches of where we just forced it too much. But I told them at the end of the day, 'All that matters is that we get the results.'''

It was CSM's first home win of the season.

"I think the fans deserved it,'' Parkhill said. "Losing that many times at home, it was good to give the fans something.''

The CSM coach singled out Ezzy Castro and Prado for their efforts throughout the match.

"Ezzy and Citlali stepped up huge today,'' he said. "Ezzy just locked down her side and was able to win and stop a lot of their attacks.''

The Flames are back in action on Wednesday when they host Hastings College for another GPAC match at 3 p.m.