LANCASTER, PA – The Johns Hopkins women's soccer team maintained control of its own destiny in the race for a bye in the upcoming Centennial Conference Tournament with a 1-0 win at Franklin & Marshall on Saturday evening.  With the win, the Blue Jays improve to 10-4-1 overall and 5-2 in the Centennial Conference.
 
The top two teams in the final regular season standings earn a bye into the semifinals in the conference tournament, while the teams seeded third and fourth will host first-round games.  With three games remaining in the regular season, the Blue Jays sit in third place with 15 points (5 wins), one point behind second-place Dickinson, which has 16 points on the strength of five wins and one tie. 
 
Playing an F&M team that sat just one behind them entering Saturday's game, the Blue Jays used a late first-half goal and a strong defensive effort to top the Diplomats (7-3-4, 3-2-2 CC).
 
The Blue Jays would fire 10 of their 13 shots in the game in the opening 45 minutes, but didn't solve F&M goalkeeper Lucy Flemming until the 44^th minute, when senior Maria Romo-Nichlols collected a cross through the box from graduate student Tatam Adamson and got to five yards from Fleming before slipping home her fourth goal of the season.
 
Fleming was equal to Hopkins' three other on-cage offerings before the break to account for a 1-0 Blue Jay lead at the half.
 
F&M, which was outshot 10-1 in the opening 45 minutes, would account for six of the nine shots in the second half and the Diplomats had three corners after halftime, but the Blue Jay defense held them off and freshman Ella Kruntchev was forced to make just one save, which came in the first half, to lock down the victory.
 
The goal for Romo-Nichols is the 19^th of her career.  With 24 assists to her credit, she needs just one goal to become the fifth player in program history to record 20 career goals and 20 career assists.
 
Johns Hopkins will return to action on Saturday, October 25 when the Blue Jays welcome Muhlenberg to Homewood Field (3 pm).  That will be followed by a key matchup with Dickinson at Homewood Field on Wednesday, October 29 in the Blue Jays' final regular season home game.