JONESBORO,
Ark. (10/21/10) - The Arkansas State soccer team dropped their final home match
of the season to No. 21 Denver, 2-0, in Sun Belt Conference action Thursday at
the ASU Soccer Complex.
Denver
improved to 15-2 with an unbeaten 9-0 league mark while the Red Wolves fell to
7-9-1 with a 3-6 mark in conference play.
"There's
a reason why they (Denver) are No. 21 in the nation, and I think today they
showed it. If I have to take any consolation out of this, it's the fact
that we didn't play our game and lost. It would have been more painful
for us to play our game and up to our potential and then come up on the short
end. We just have to look forward to North Texas now," said head coach Tafadzwa
Ziyenge.
Denver
struck early when Kaitlin Bast headed in a short corner played to her by
Nicholette DiGiacamo in the 10th minute (9:45).
Bast
then one timed a shot into the net from the 18 to the far post which was passed
to her from Kalie Vaughn at the 16-minute mark.
"In
the second half, we did start to settle down, but what we needed to do was
settle down early to prevent them from scoring. Again, there's a reason why
they've won the conference so many times. This is what they do to a lot
of teams. They are able to take an early lead and then just cruise. I
think we saw an example of that. In the second half, they were content to
just let us put a little bit of pressure on them. Then, they just clear it
away. It's a little bit unfortunate that we brought in our highest
intensity after two goals had gone in. If we had it do to differently, we
would have tried to start from the get-go. It might have been that we got
overwhelmed by the occasion, because it was Denver and because we are so young.
We learned something out of this, and hopefully we'll meet them again."
Denver outshot ASU 18-10 including a 12-6
margin in the first half, taking 11 shots on goal to the Red Wolves three.
Junior
goalkeeper Megan Stoltzfus made seven saves in the contest. Michele Clark,
Ashley McMurtry and Megan Mace each had two shots to lead ASU's efforts.
ASU
continues league action when they travel to Denton, Texas to face the Mean
Green of North Texas on Sunday at 1 p.m.
