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Alabama Soccer 5-1 Over Rice
The Alabama soccer team
scored five goals by five different players, all while only allowing
Rice to find the net once, en route to a 5-1 victory on Sunday night at
the Alabama Soccer Complex. This marks the third home game win in a
row, improving the Tide to 3-2-1 for the season.
"They (Rice)
gave us a great fight, but at the end of the day we outlasted them,"
head coach Wes Hart shared. "It was a very evenly-contested first half,
then we finally wore them down in the second half. As the game wore on,
we became stronger and more confident. We scored goals and with goals
comes the confidence. This is one of the best attacking nights we have
had."
The first 30 minutes was a feeling-out process that
featured just one shot by Rice (2-2-1), which was harmless, and took
little effort from UA sophomore goalkeeper Alex Plavin. Then in the
30th minute of the game, sophomore midfielder Kaley Verpaele found an
opening to shoot. Her shot was saved by Rice goalkeeper Bella Killgore
and bounced back in the field of play. Sophomore Taylor Morgan tallied
her first of two assists of the game by touching the rebound to
Verpaele for a goal. The rest of the first half remained scoreless.
It
seemed as the though the second half started out the same as the first
half, with few shot attempts. Redshirt freshman Gabby Duca started the
action packed final 20 minutes of the second half off in the 70th
minute with a goal off a double assist from Morgan and sophomore Gigi
Schorr.
In the 77th minute, Alabama was presented with a free
kick at the top of the box. Senior Abbie Boswell's strike was tipped
off the crossbar by Killgore, but went right to the feet of junior
Nealy Martin, who scored her first goal of the season when she
deposited the ball in the back of the net.
Rice ended its
scoreless drought in the 81st minute when senior Darcy Mickalow's cross
cleared the head of Plavin and into the side netting to cut the score
to 3-1. However, less than three minutes later, the Tide tallied its
fourth goal of the game as sophomore Casey Wertz scored her
team-leading fourth goal of the season. The last goal of the game came
courtesy of a penalty kick from senior Christina Maartensson in the
87th minute, giving the Tide three goals in a nine-minute span to put
the game out of reach.
The Tide, who outshot the Owls, 6-4, in
the first half, ended the game with a 20-11 advantage in shots. Alabama
doubled Rice's shots-on-goal total, as well, putting nine on target
compared to Rice's four. The Tide also attempted seven corner kicks,
four more than the Owls.
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