LONDON, Ont. - Fifth-year striker Julia Crnjac scored a pair of clutch goals in her return from injury to help lead the Western women's soccer team past the Queen's Gaels in their OUA Final Four matchup.

With the win, the Mustangs will move on to the OUA Championship game, where they will take on the OUA East powerhouse Ottawa Gee-Gees on Sunday afternoon on Mustangs Field.

Crnjac entered the Final Four match after being sidelined with a clavicle injury for the past ten games and barely two days of conditioning under her belt. However, in her final year with the team, Crnjac proved once again why she is held in such high esteem by both players and coaches alike.

"For Julia to be able to make her return in such a high-stakes moment and shine the way she did just shows how mentally tough she truly is," said Mustang assistant coach Mark Haynes. "She hasn't been able to train at all with her injury, so all she was only able to train twice this week before jumping back in. There aren't many players who could come back into a game and be productive, let alone score the way she did tonight. That's what makes her such a special player. What a performance."

"In terms of fitness, returning so quickly after not being able to train for such a long time was tough," said Crnjac. "I put as much preparation as possible, but I didn't think I'd be able to keep going all the way into overtime. I just wasn't able to do enough conditioning. But having the home crowd and my teammates behind me helped me to just keep going. It was an amazing feeling."

Western's Anna Larkin was also instrumental in the victory, once again scoring a game-winning playoff goal to help the Mustangs gain the upper hand in overtime.

Like so many of the Mustangs' games this season, the matchup against the Gaels proved to be a back and forth affair from the opening minute, with neither team earning a shot on goal through much of the first half. The game remained a defensive showdown until the final whistle in the half as the game remained deadlocked at 0-0.

The match remained a defensive battle until midway through the half, where Crnjac capped off her return to action with the first goal of the game to give the Mustangs the momentum. Crnjac's goal allowed Western to gamble and put additional pressure on the Queen's defence, but that pressure also left the Mustangs vulnerable to the play making of the Gaels' OUA East MVP Jenny Wolever, who set up teammate Sarah Nixon perfectly to tie the game at 1-1 to force an overtime period.

The Gaels wasted no time in the extra frame, as Kelsie McGinn scored off a turnover in front of the Mustangs' net to take the 2-1 lead early in overtime. However, Crnjac continued to add onto her storied return, scoring once again to tie the game at 2-2 just minutes later to give the purple and white life once more.

The game remained tied into the second half of overtime, until Larkin scored to give Western the 3-2 lead midway through the half and ultimately the victory, as they earned their way to the gold-medal match with an incredible effort from the entire roster.

"I'm just so proud of our entire team tonight, our perseverance was unbelievable and it turned out to be a complete team effort," said Crnjac. "It's so difficult to have to play from behind, especially after holding a lead, but we adapted and found a way to counter. The praise has to go to our whole team after an effort like that. But as happy as we are with tonight, we're excited to get prepared for Sunday's game. Our focus is on winning the championship."

"We told the players coming into tonight that if they won their individual battles then we'd be in a good position to win and it ultimately took a good 120 minutes of battling to come out with a victory against this Queen's team," said Haynes. "Obviously with Martin [Painter] in Ottawa with the men's team today, there were some adjustments to be made, but we have a lot of leaders on our roster. We'll have another big test this Sunday, but after seeing so many people step up today, we're looking good moving forward."

Mustangs will be back in action this Sunday, November 4 where they will take on the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees in the gold-medal match.