Murray State University Athletics
Racers Face Hokies in NCAA Tournament First Round Battle
11/13/2009 4:00:00 PM | Women's Soccer
The Murray State Women's soccer team will begin first round play of their first NCAA Tournament, Friday at Baujan Field in Dayton, Ohio, as they take on No. 3 seed, Virginia Tech. Game time is set for 4 p.m. central time.
MSU enters the tournament after receiving an automatic bid for becoming Ohio Valley Conference Tournament Champions. The Racers enter the tournament with an 11-8-2 overall record, while playing to a 5-2-1 OVC record.
Danielle McMurray leads the team in points (15), assists (5) and shots on goal (19). She tallied two assists over the weekend at the OVC Tournament. Kalli McCoy scored her team-leading sixth goal of the season at the tournament, to go along with her second assist of the year. OVC Tournament Most Valuable Player, Sophie Hargreaves, has tallied five goals and four assists, despite playing on the back line for several matches. Nicole Evans is the fourth Racer with double-digit points, as she has tallied five goals and three assists.
Ashley Fraser, who had seen time in just seven matches all season, tallied her first two goals of the season in the first two rounds of the OVC Tournament, and both turned out to be game-winners in the Racers 1-0 victories over Eastern Kentucky and UT Martin. Sydney Smith and Rebecca Shultz each tallied their first goals of the season during the OVC Tournament as well.
The Racers defense deserves a lot of credit as they have tallied seven shutouts in their last eight matches, including three-straight in the OVC Tournament. While goalkeeper Tara Isbell gets credit for the victories and shutouts in net, her defensive teammates have had a lot to do with it. Gina Killion, Audrey Wilson, Jenna Fioranelli and Veronika Pribyslavska have spent the majority of time in the back line, but the recent contributions of Maja Nordahl and Hargreaves on the back line has had a huge impact as well.
Isbell tallied 17 saves over the weekend, while recording three shutouts to help improve her record to 6-4-1 with six shutouts. She has tallied 52 saves while allowing just 10 goals in 12 matches to give her a 0.89 goals against average.
Racers Rewind
MSU entered the tournament as the No. 3 seed and opened play against sixth-seeded Eastern Kentucky. Fraser scored the eventual game-winning goal late in the 86th minute of play to lead MSU to a 1-0 victory and a match-up with the second-seeded UT Martin.
UT Martin looked like they were ready to take a 1-0 lead in the 34th minute as they took a ball away from Isbell and fired a shot at the net, but a diving header by Hargreaves at the goal line saved the Racers and kept the match scoreless. Just five minutes later Fraser was back at it, scoring her second game-winning goal in as many matches to put MSU ahead 1-0 as they would eventually win and move on to their first championship match against Tennessee Tech.
The Racers came out against TTU ready to secure their spot in the NCAA Tournament as Shultz scored just five minutes into the match. McCoy expanded the Racers lead to 2-0 in the 15th minute of play and MSU would never look back as goals by Smith and Rachel Wright gave the Racers the 4-0 victory, which was the largest margin of victory in OVC Soccer Championship history.
Scouting the Hokies
Virginia Tech makes their second consecutive trip to the NCAA Tournament as they earned an at-large bid after going 14-7 overall and 7-4 in ACC matches. The Hokies enter the tournament ranked 17th in the latest NSCAA division I soccer poll.
The Hokies have a trio of fire power on offense as Kelly Conheeney and Jennifer Harvey have eight goals each, while Marika Gray has seven on the season. Gray leads the team in shots (57), shots on goal (25) and game-winning goals with four. Julian Johnson leads the team with six assists, while scoring four goals.
Virginia Tech is led in net by Kristin Carden who has posted a 9-5 record. She has tallied 52 saves and one shutout while allowing 19 goals. The Hokies have allowed 30 goals this season.
The Hokies biggest win of the season came against then #1North Carolina on Oct. 4 in the form of a 1-0 shutout.
Live Video/Stats
Visit http://www.daytonflyers.com/sports/w-soccer/spec-rel/dayt-09-ncaa-tourney.html for live video and stats during the match.
