Lady Yellowjackets Lose Overtime Thriller at Chico State (Sept. 24, 2003)
CHICO, CA – The MSU Billings women’s soccer
team felt that it could compete with some of the best teams in the
region and the Yellowjackets proved that Wednesday night in a 1-0
loss to the region’s ninth-ranked team, Chico State. The game was
played at 7:00 p.m. Pacific Time in Chico. The loss drops the
Yellowjackets to 3-4-1 for the Season. The Wildcats improved to
5-4-1.
Goalkeeper Megan
Plank (Fr., Phoenix, AZ) was stellar in goal for the
Yellowjackets, making 14 saves in the game. She stopped eight
first-half shots and six in the second half to carry the
Yellowjackets into the overtime period. Chico State out-shot
MSU Billings 26-4 in regulation, but Plank stoned the Wildcats for
90 minutes.
"It was one of the best
performances I've ever seen by a keeper," said head coach Don
Trentham. "The first fifteen minutes, we didn't play
very well. They actually had two shots that hit the post in
the first five minutes of the game. But as the game went on,
Megan made a save here and a save there and we started to play
better. I think her play gave confidence to the rest of the
team and we started to play better."
Freshman Ally
Taylor (Ojai, CA) had four of the Yellowjackets’ five shots in
the game. Kendall Blanc (Fr., Lehi, UT) had the other. Taylor had two chances to win the game.
Late in regulation she had a strong shot on goal stopped by Chico
goalkeeper Angela Orr. She then had a chance in the overtime
period with a shot that appeared to be going into the net until
bouncing off the crossbar.
The Wildcats avoided the upset in the 95th minute when Jessica Parker took a feed from Janelle Raaff just
past the midfield and beat her defender to the top of the box
where she got off the game winner from 18 yards out.
"It was probably the
gutsiest performance we've had in my two years at MSUB," said
Trentham. "We played with great passion. It was
definitely a fun game to watch. After the game you watched
the players limping through the line shaking hands.
Everyone's jersey was soaked with sweat and you could see that
mutual respect that they had after a hard-fought game."
MSU Billings will play at Sonoma State on
Friday and at San Francisco State on Sunday. Sonoma fell out of
the region’s top ten for the first time this week while San
Francisco State is ranked fourth. |
