UPCOMING MATCHES
Game Notes
UC Irvine Anteaters at Portland Pilots
Friday, September 11, 2015
7:00 PM - Portland, Ore.
Live Stats Live Stream
UC Irvine Anteaters vs. Washington Huskies
Sunday, September 13, 2015
12:00 PM - Portland, Ore.
Live Stats Live Stream
ALL FOR ONE AND ONE FOR ALL
The Anteaters went up to Saint Mary's College and came away with a pair of 1-0 victories against Mountain West foes Nevada and Colorado State.
In fact, all four matches at the Gael Classic finished with a 1-0 scoreline with Saint Mary's taking away a pair of 1-0 wins and even went to overtime to dispatch Nevada much like the 'Eaters. Even the Saint Mary's men's side had a 1-0 victory on Sunday.
Both 1s came from the foot of Tatyana Garrett after putting in a total of 46 minutes on the weekend. She waited until the 103rd minute of the match to put away Nevada in double overtime. Sunday it only took her five minutes to punch home a goal in the 30th minute.
Garrett has five career goals now, and all have come in the last six matches she's entered. Three of those goals have accounted for game-winners with two of them carrying extra drama in double overtime waiting until the 109th and now 103rd minutes.
"Tats is high impact off the bench," Head Coach Scott Juniper said of Garrett. "She creates chaos for defenders, and has taken her chances well."
Those chances have come in a total of 59 minutes this season where she's put up six shots, one every 10 minutes, and turned four of those six on net. Her four shots on goal tie her for the team lead with Alex Karlowitsch.
312
Another development from the weekend is the Anteaters' defensive prowess which has not allowed a goal in 312 minutes now which began near the end of the Texas A&M match.
A scoreless draw with Abilene Christian followed by two shutouts in Northern California have given Coach Juniper and his crew its longest shutout streak since the 2012 'Eaters went 419 consecutive minutes.
"The team defends our goal. It needs everyone buying into what is required within our system to make it work. This team has taken ownership of that commitment, and everyone can take credit from the forwards to the keepers."
Senior keeper Corey Tobin was right in the middle of that 2012 shutout streak as a freshman. She's earned three clean sheets in 2015 which equals her high for a season set in 2012 and 2013.
An ever-evolving clutch of defenders and attacking mids have made their presence felt around her with senior and minutes-leader Clarissa Robles captaining the bunch along with veterans Kelsey Texeira and Haley O'Brien, sophomores Andrea Mensen and Grayson Galbraith, and a whole array of cogs with Sammie James, Shelby Lee, and Brittany Nguyen.
TECHNICAL SQUAD
Another weekend trip to a far off land for a tournament is ahead for the 'Eaters. This time, they head to Portland, Oregon for the site of the Nike Portland Invitational on the campus of the University of Portland.
Both matches will be live streamed with UCI filling the Friday primetime slot and ending the weekend with the lunch special at noon on Sunday.
Adding to the televised list will be UC Irvine's Sun. Oct. 18th match at home against No. 23 Long Beach State. The match will be broadcast on ESPN3 as one of four live streamed Big West matches this season.
CASCADIA MANIA
The trips just keep on coming as UC Irvine heads a little more north to Portland for the Nike Portland Invitational.
The Pilots' vaunted Merlo Field will be the site of both matches, a stadium that pulls in around 3,000 fans per match, something Coach Juniper and his program are not foreign to.
"It doesn't get any more hostile than playing in front of 5,000 fans at Texas A&M so I don't expect a problem there."
It will be the fourth trip to Portland to face the Pilots, first since 1997, where they've lost the previous three matches. UCI got the best of Portland last time in 2011 in front of a women's soccer record crowd of 1,611 at Anteater Stadium for a 3-1 'Eater win.
Coming off a 7-9-3 season, the Pilots have sunk to 1-4 so far in 2015. The lone win was a 4-3 shootout over Marquette followed by losses against Michigan, Illinois, and a No. 6 Notre Dame squad.
Freshman Rachel Lusby has taken over in net the last two matches stopping 13 shots. Junior Hanna De Haan played the first three allowing seven goals and stopping nine shots.
The five goals have been spread out between upperclassmen Allison Wetherington, Noelle La Prevotte, Haylee DeGrood and Devlyn Jeter, and a freshman in Cecilia Pedersen.
The weekend finishes with an old friend in the Washington Huskies hanging just outside the top-25 with a 4-1 record. The Huskies were wiped in the Third Round of the NCAA Tournament in 2014 finishing with a 14-7-2 record. They booted UCI from the tournament in 2010 with a 1-0 victory in double overtime.
UW is coming off a dramatic win which saw an 89th-minute header goal from Kelcie Hedge accompanied by an eight-save performance from Megan Kufeld to preserve the shutout. Kufeld has allowed three goals in five matches stopping 21 shots along the way.
Hedge is one of seven goal scorers on the year with junior Amanda Perez leading the squad with two. Sophomore Shannon Simon has three assists to go with her goal.
Coach Juniper knows its business as usual, "we are playing two more high-level opponents and will prepare the team in the same way as we always do. The staff have prepared a series of practices where we improve some pieces of our system from the previous weekend, and address the tactical layers for upcoming games."
_________________________________________________________________
For UC Irvine Athletics ticket information, please call (949) 824-5000 or e-mail athletics.tickets@uci.edu. For more information click here.
For information on how you can help support UC Irvine Athletics, please call (949) 824-6933 or e-mail aaf@uci.edu. For additional information, click here.
You can also follow us on Facebook, Twitter and by downloading the UCI Front Row app, available free to all Anteater fans through iTunes and Google Play, to view schedules, results, and up-to-the-minute news.
