The women’s soccer team won its two games this past week and will take a 4-2-0 record into the start of Ivy League play next Sunday.
Brown 2, UMass 1
The Bears went on the road and defeated the University of Massachusetts at Amherst (3-5-1) last Thursday night 2-1 at Rudd Field.
In her fifth college game, midfielder Carly Gould ’17 scored her first goal in a Brown uniform 17 minutes and 47 seconds into the match with a header set up by a corner kick from Annie Gillen ’15.
As the first half drew to a close, the Minutewomen equalized the score when Alyssa D’Arcy received a pass from Daniela Alvarez and sent the ball soaring past Bears goalie Amber Bledsoe ’14.
The winning goal came just over a minute into the second half after a Brown corner kick deflected off a UMass defender into her own net.
“Our corner kick offense was big, because we scored both of our goals from that,” Gould said. “At the same time, our corner kick defense has been improving, and it’s definitely paying off.”
Head Coach Phil Pincince said the team had devoted a practice to corner kicks “just two practices prior” to the UMass game. He credited Brown’s aggressiveness on defense as the deciding factor against the Minutewomen.
“We didn’t give up,” Pincince said. “It was a real physical game, and we were very, very patient in what we were trying to do.”
Overall, the Bears outshot the Minutewomen 13-9, with Captain Mika Siegelman ’14 leading the team with five shots. Bruno held UMass to three shots in the second half.
Bledsoe was credited with two saves, while Mary Catherine Barrett ’14, who has typically kept goal for the second half of Brown’s games this season, recorded one save in her half of play and was awarded the victory.
Brown 2, Sacred Heart 0
Bruno hosted Sacred Heart (3-6-0) Sunday afternoon, beating the Pioneers 2-0 in the Bears’ last match before the beginning of Ivy League play.
Last year’s contest between the two schools ended in a 1-0 victory for Brown, but the Pioneers came into the tilt on a two-game winning streak, having beaten the University of Massachusetts at Lowell and Yale in the past two weeks. Brown was also Sacred Heart’s fourth Ivy League opponent in its last five games.
The game started off slowly, with most of the action occurring between the two sides’ goal boxes. In the first 10 minutes, only one shot was attempted, by Sacred Heart’s Elisa Robiglio.
In the 25th minute, forward Chloe Cross ’15 received a lob pass from Gould and tapped it into the net past goalie Sydney Judkins. But the shot was declared offside, nullifying the would-be goal.
Three minutes later, Brown narrowly missed scoring again, when midfielder Kirsten Belinsky ’15 failed to capitalize on a cross into the goal box from Gould. The two teams entered halftime scoreless.
“We struggled (against Sacred Heart) in the first half,” Pincince said. “I don’t think our midfielders and forwards were on the same page.”
A goal was finally scored 56:45 into the game, when forward Sydney
Calas ’17 outran her defender and lobbed the ball towards Siegelman, who was standing a few feet in front of Judkins. The pass deflected off of Siegelman toward a sprinting Cross, who shot the ball straight into the net.
In a similar play eight minutes later, Calas again rushed past the Sacred Heart defensive line and quickly passed the ball to Cross who, undefended, sunk the ball into the bottom left corner of the goal to make the score 2-0.
“In the first half we weren’t attacking so well,” Cross said. “After halftime we were really focused on moving forward. When we got our opportunities, we stepped up and put them away.”
Cross, who also scored the lone goal in last year’s victory over the Pioneers, called Calas a rising star.
“Obviously Sydney hasn’t played that much so far, but she’s done a great job filling her role,” Cross said.
On defense, Brown was led by back Ali Mullin ’14, who guarded Sacred Heart’s leading goal-scorer, Kristin Verrette, for most of the game. Verrette, who has recorded 36 shots this year and is the reigning Northeast Conference Player of the Week, failed to get a single shot until the second half.
“She’s an unsung hero,” Pincince said of Mullin. “She doesn’t stick out — she just gets her job done, and I’m very pleased with what she’s done all year.”
The Bears next take the field Sunday, when they host Dartmouth at 1 p.m. Going into Ivy League play, Pincince says the team is focused on continuing to improve from game to game.
“The Ivy games are still soccer games,” Pincince said. “We need to come out, play like we can and not think that everything has changed. These six games we’ve played have been tools for us to open up conference play.”
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