FRIDAY’S GAME
No. 19 Oregon State at Sun Devils
When: 7:00 p.m.
Where: ASU Soccer Stadium
Beavers update: OSU’s only two losses this season have come against then-No. 5 Florida State and No. 3 UCLA. If the Beavers can shut down ASU’s sporadic offense, they should be able to leave with a win.
With an RPI in the triple digits and a record below .500, ASU’s soccer team can’t afford more defeats if they want to advance to a third straight NCAA tournament.
Hampered with injuries and inconsistent play, the Sun Devils need to find ways to win games.
“It’s crunch time. We need to start winning games,” sophomore midfielder Blair Alderson said.
“They’re all games that we need to win,” coach Kevin Boyd said. “What we’ve done is we’ve put ourselves in a position that we have to fight to get above .500.
“Being in the Pac and having to get a lot of results late is never a good thing. We need to take care of our home weekends when we get them.”
ASU returns home for the first time in three weeks. The Sun Devils are 3-1 this season in Tempe, and 2-5 elsewhere.
The players are really excited for to the team’s return home.
“I hate being on the road,” senior defender Kate Sangster said. “I like being at home. Something about being under the lights, being on our field, having our field, our fans, it’s easier to play.”
“We’re so excited to play at home,” Alderson said. “We miss our fans and just to play at home, it’s a different vibe, and we need that right now.”
The Sun Devils face a stern test in the first matchup of their three-game homestand. No. 19 Oregon State (8-3-1, 2-1 Pac-12) comes to town on Friday, led by their stringent defense.
In 12 games this season, the Beavers allowed just seven goals. OSU senior goalie Colleen Boyd set the Oregon State school record for goals against average last season (0.56).
“She’s good, obviously, goes without saying, runs in the family,” Kevin Boyd said jokingly. “The reason she has .6 (goals) against is one: that she’s good and two: her defense in front of her allows very few chances, and when they do allow a chance, it’s not a good chance.
“They defend with a lot of numbers, they’re good defenders, they’re good sound group, they’re well-organized, they’re going to make it difficult for us to create (scoring chances).”
Along with their tough defense, Oregon State has two game-changing forwards, junior Chelsea Buckland and sophomore Jenna Richardson. Buckland has six goals on the season, while Richardson has four.
After squaring off against the Beavers, ASU will play an opponent that is evenly matched with them.
Oregon (6-5-1, 1-2 Pac-12) has lost five of their past seven games after a strong start, mainly due to a tougher schedule.
“I think they’re about the same as us to be honest,” Boyd said. “Looking at their results in terms of what they’ve done recently they look about the same.”
Both ASU and Oregon have similar overall records and are 1-2 in conference play. Both teams lost to the same opponent (Utah).
Each week, ASU’s players are closer and closer to recovering from injuries. Two injured Sun Devil forwards returned to the line-up in the past two weeks and a third, sophomore Devin Marshall, is also close to returning from an ankle injury.
Reach the reporter at justin.janssen@asu.edu
Click here to subscribe to the daily State Press newsletter.
