BAKERSFIELD, Calif. - The Southern Utah soccer team opened a three-game, two-week road trip Friday evening against the CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners. The teams were evenly match throughout most of the game until a late goal by CSUB gave the Roadrunners a 1-0 win.
"It was a unfortunate result, but I thought it was a pretty even match played by a couple teams that both wanted a result," head coach Fred Thompson said. "Both teams played hard, both teams kept pushing forward, kept trying to score goals, we just fell a little short. At the end of the day we still have some mental mistakes to clean up."
Both teams were evenly matched for the first half and beyond with the score holding at 0-0 for the first 83 minutes of play. The Roadrunners outshot the Thunderbirds in the first half 8-2, but four saves from Brianna Aldridge and two blocked shots from the Thunderbird defense kept CSUB off the board.
The Roadrunners were able to break through in the 84th minute on a corner kick that was sent into the box and then redirected into the goal.
"One of the things we want to pride ourselves on is being very strong and very solid on set pieces. We lost some concentration on the corner kick and that's all there was to it," Thompson said. "To their credit, they kept their focus and showed a lot of composure to receive it in the box and find a way to slot it."
The Thunderbirds would not be able to break through and tie the game in the final minutes, falling 1-0 on the road.
"When we aren't getting what we want offensively, we want to be as solid as possible on defense. I thought we did really well until late in the game when we lost focus for just a second and it cost us," Thompson said. "Hopefully as the season goes on, we can take it later into the game and eventually be able to hold our focus for the whole game."
The Thunderbirds will now travel to Idaho to take on the Boise State Broncos on Sunday. The match is set to begin at 1:00 p.m. Mountain time.
Follow Us
Stay up to date during the 2018 Thunderbird soccer season by following @SUUSoccer on Twitter and Instagram and liking the Southern Utah Soccer page on Facebook.
