The UCLA women’s soccer team kicked off Beat ‘SC
week in the most brutal fashion imaginable Sunday afternoon.
It took two overtimes, 22 shots, two injuries, a missed penalty
kick, and nine corner kicks for the No. 3 Bruins to finally put
away USC 1-0 in the second round of the NCAA playoffs.
The Golden Goal came in the 103rd minute when sophomore defender
Kendal Billingsley collected an oddly bouncing corner kick among a
flurry of USC and UCLA bodies to put away the game-winner.
“I was ecstatic, it was a great feeling (to score the game
winner),” Billingsley said. “It was a long game. It
felt like there was a force field (blocking the USC goal) and to
finally get one in was awesome.”
USC’s strategy was painfully obvious.
The Women of Troy eventually dropped into a 5-4-1 formation,
essentially playing nine defenders, with a constant stream of
substitutions. This strategy was successful thanks in large part to
the spectacular play of USC goalie Julie Peterson.
At halftime, the Bruins had outshot the Women of Troy 8-1, but
Peterson notched seven saves in the first half and finished the
game with 10. The Bruins wound up outshooting USC 22-2.
“The big thing we talked about at halftime was trying not
to let them disrupt our rhythm,” UCLA head coach Jillian
Ellis said. “They were just looking for the counter goal.
That sometimes is frustrating because they’re by-passing our
midfield.”
In the 22nd minute, midfielder Jill Oakes was fouled hard and
twisted her knee and was out for the rest of the afternoon. Nine
minutes later senior defender Tracey Winzen sustained a collision
and rolled her ankle and also did not return.
The brutality carried over into the second half. In the 54th
minute freshman forward Iris Mora was flattened inside the USC
goalie box, and UCLA was awarded a penalty kick.
Junior defender Nandi Pryce shot the penalty kick into the right
corner, but it was blocked by Peterson.
“For about five or six minutes I was replaying (the missed
kick) in my head and thinking “˜if we don’t win this
game, I’m going to quit soccer,'” Pryce said.
“There was going to have to be some other way for us to
win.”
It was a wild game, as the number of UCLA shots that barely
missed is too numerous to catalogue, and it seemed that every
player who had the ball went down hard into the Drake Stadium
turf.
Close to the end of the first overtime, sophomore forward Kim
Devine was shoved hard into the ground by a USC defender inside the
box, and no foul was called. Drake Stadium erupted into boos.
“Kids just don’t fall without being hit,”
Ellis said who engaged in a colorful discussion with the official
after the first overtime.
The Bruins had no trouble finishing on Friday night, as they
easily put away LMU 4-0. Junior Sarah-Gayle Swanson scored two
goals in the first half.