Women’s soccer makes comeback to win against Wake Forest, falls to UNC
Senior forward Taylor Smith scored the tying goal against Wake Forest in the second half. (Miriam Bribiesca/Daily Bruin senior staff)
By Korbin Placet
Sept. 14, 2015 3:10 p.m.
At the end of the first half against Wake Forest, the UCLA women’s soccer team was facing a familiar storyline – poor transition defense had saddled the Bruins with a 1-0 deficit.
But they were determined not to add a third straight loss to a string of disappointing early-season results.
“I think after the first half we were kind of devastated that were down a goal. We were in the half constantly and then we weren’t,” said junior midfielder Lauren Kaskie. “Then at halftime we collected our thoughts and we just came together as a team.”
UCLA (3-4) came out aggressively in the second half, pushing for shot opportunities inside the box. It paid off in the 57th minute, as senior forward Kodi Lavrusky earned a penalty kick.
Senior forward Taylor Smith converted the kick to even the score.
“There was a lot of pressure to tie it up,” Smith said. “But after (the penalty kick) – I think it really led to the momentum to get our team going to win the game.”
In the 80th minute, Kaskie scored the game-winning goal, launching a one-timer into the back of the net off a feed from junior forward Amber Munerlyn.
Struggling with position turnover this season, the Bruins have now allowed more goals in their first six games than they did all last season. Coach Amanda Cromwell said a lot of the problems have been in the midfield and in the team’s transition into defense.
“We need to work on our transition defense. When we give the ball away, we’ve just got to be able to defend better and transition better,” Cromwell said. “We are just giving up too many goals on transition.”
Tar Heels cruise
On Sunday, the women’s team took on its second top-10 team in the last two weeks – No. 4 University of North Carolina (7-0-1). This time the outcome was not in the Bruins’ favor.
Behind 1-0 at halftime, Cromwell replaced redshirt junior goalie Cassie Sternbach with redshirt freshman Arielle Schechtman.
Schechtman, however, wasn’t able to stop the Tar Heels from scoring two additional goals. Only Lavrusky was able to score for UCLA, on an assist from junior midfielder Annie Alvarado.
The Bruins, now 3-4 for the season, have fallen out of the national rankings after starting the season at No. 4.
UCLA returns home Thursday when it takes on No. 14 Pepperdine.
