Kentucky Unable to Solve Missouri's Defense, Blanked by Tigers
COLUMBIA, Mo. – The Kentucky women’s soccer team
was blanked by the Missouri Tigers on Thursday night at the Audrey J. Walton
Soccer Stadium in Columbia, as UK dropped a 2-0 decision and was shutout for just
the second time all season.
With the loss to the Tigers, Kentucky drops to
4-4-2 on the year, and sits on one point in Southeastern Conference play at
0-2-1 in league action. Missouri moves to 7-2-0 on the year and now has six SEC
points to its name at 2-1-0 in the SEC.
Missouri dominated most phases of the stat
sheet on Thursday night, tallying a season-high 32 shots in the match to
Kentucky’s seven, and made UK freshman goalkeeper Evangeline Soucie to make a
season-high tying 11 saves in the match.
Missouri took the lead in the 33rd
minute off the foot of Bethany Coons, on her first goal of the season. Coons
struck the ball from five yards out after Jessica Johnson launched a shot that
hit the bottom end of the crossbar and fell to the foot of Coons. Coons then
took a touch to the inside to shake her defender and then score the
match-opening goal.
After a fairly-even second half in which
Kentucky generated a lot more offensive opportunities and scoring chances, the
Tigers struck late to seal away the three points for the Tigers as Sarah
Luebbert got in behind the Kentucky defense in the 85th minute and chipped in
her sixth goal of the season over the diving Soucie.
Kentucky was able to generate four corner
kicks in the dying minutes of the match, but was unable to score off of any of
them as the Wildcats were held scoreless for just the second time all season.
Kentucky is next on the road at No. 12 South
Carolina this Sunday afternoon at 2 p.m. ET. The match will be shown live on
the SEC Network+, ESPN3 and the WatchESPN app.
For the latest on the Kentucky women’s soccer team, follow @UKWomensSoccer on Twitter,
Instagram and Facebook, as well as on the web at UKathletics.com.
