No. 1 Radford Advances to Semifinals with 2-0 Win Over No. 8 High Point
The Radford women's soccer team defeated No. 8 High Point, 2-0, in a Big South Championships Quarterfinal match on Saturday evening at Cupp Stadium.
The Highlanders controlled the tempo all match and mostly in the first half firing 17 shots. Radford broke the scoreless match in the 29
th minute as
Jessica Wollmann played the ball back to
Emily Dunn about 30 yards away from the goal. Dunn crossed the ball to the middle of the 18-yard box where
Jasmine Casarez had her sights set on her 11
th goal of the season.
Casarez bodied a High Point defender and headed the ball passed Emily Lyons, the Panther goalkeeper, for the goal. The Big South Attacking Player of the Year's goal gave Radford a 1-0 lead.
The Highlanders were not done firing shots. They kept the pressure on and fired six more shots to close out the first half.
Just five minutes into the second half, the Highlanders took a 2-0 lead. The ball went out of bounds on the High Point attacking side and gave Radford a corner kick.
Jordan Lundin played the ball in and found
Jane Everett just outside the six yard box. The senior defender headed the ball perfectly and it found the back of the net for her first goal of the season.
With a 2-0 lead, Radford dropped back to a more defensive heavy look. High Point pursued offensively and had a couple of scoring chances, but they were denied thanks to
Courtenay Kaplan. In the 75
th minute a Panther shot hit the crossbar and vaulted back into play. It bounced right back to Zoe Wehr, who took a shot, but Kaplan made a great save to keep the shutout intact.
Not converting on back-to-back scoring chance knocked the wind out of the eighth-seeded teams sails and the Panthers only took one more shot to close out the final 15 minutes.
The shutout victory is Radford's eighth shutout win of the season and fourth in a row.
MOMENT THAT MATTERED
Radford came out strong in the first half and fired 17 shots, while holding the Panthers to only two. Many of the 17 first half shots were close, but the 11
thshot of the match finally fell. The Highlanders showed strong defense in the first half as well. The balanced attack was too much for High Point to handle throughout the match.
STAT OF THE MATCH
The Highlander offense took 29 shots with 11 landing on goal in Saturday's match. Radford has taken 60 shots in the two matches against the Panthers and has totaled five goals.
STAT LEADERS
Casarez took 10 shots – leading all players, while Wollmann added three. Heading up another shutout was Kaplan, who picked up four saves – all in the second half.
QUOTABLE
"I thought we played well tonight,"
Ben Sohrabi said. "We played good soccer, were strong defensively and moved the ball well offensively. We did all the things right, which is something you want as a coach. I give a lot of credit to High Point. They never quit and are a very good No. 8 seed. To play the defending conference champions and move on makes me very happy and we'll take it any day."