Women's soccer falls short, 1-0
The Santa Monica College women’s soccer team lost a tough first match this past Friday night against Riverside College, 1-0. The score was tied 0-0 until the last five minutes of the match when Riverside midfielder Caitlin Crouse scored on a penalty kick.
Midfielder Brittany Garcia, forward Meg Pierce, and forward Olivia Patterson had five combined shots in the first half and another six in the second half.
Overall, Coach Aaron Benditson was “very proud of [his players’] effort and energy.”
Benditson gave credit to Riverside's goalie.
"She made it difficult for us to finish in front of the goal,” said Benditson.
Throughout the entire 90 minutes of play, the Corsairs had over five offside calls against them. The Corsairs also had almost ten corner kicks in their favor, yet were unable to score.
“We did not execute the corner kick plays we had gone over in practice,” said Benditson. “Credit to the goalie. She’s an amazing goalie and had numerous great saves.”
The Corsairs’ goalie, Alisha Sheldon, did not see much action until the 30-minute mark of the second half.
Riverside took a corner kick and Sheldon was able to tap it over the goal post in order to prevent the first goal of the game.
The next corner kick was a great defensive play led by Ally Bustos to push the ball in the Corsairs' favor.
Although the Corsairs' defense (also led by Bustos) played extremely strong, Benditson continually shouted, “don’t over-pursue," throughout the game.
With 19 minutes remaining in the first half, Garcia and Pierce nearly had a breakaway goal but Riverside’s goalie was able to deflect the shot.
With seven minutes to go in the second half,Patterson took a hard shot on the goal only to be stopped again by the Riverside goalie.
Patterson took one last shot at the ten-second mark but was not successful.
“We will work on finishing in front of the goal,” said Coach Benditson in regards to future practices.
Benditson also reminded the Corsairs to take opportunities given and to execute them to create good plays and to score.
"We won’t win too many soccer games," said Benditson. "If we can‘t finish in front of the goal."
The next game will be held at East LA on Friday, Sept. 9, at 6:00 p.m.