By: Aaron Richardson
By a 3–0 score, SFU women’s soccer team won their third game in a row this Saturday night against the Northwest Nazarene Crusaders. Although there were no goals scored until the last minute of the first half, the SFU women were continually pushing for a goal, and fired seven shots at the Northwest goalie Danielle Ortiz in the first half of the game. Near the end of the first half, SFU’s effort began to pay off. With a series of near misses at goal, the game began to heat up. With just over a minute left in the first half, Emma Pringle, assisted by Jenna-lee Baxter, scored the first goal of the game against Northwest.
This was Pringle’s sixth goal in the last three games, and 10th overall this season, but still not her last of the night. With just 10 minutes left at the end of the game, she scored the second goal for SFU resulting in a 2–0 lead over the Crusaders. Assisted by a fantastic 30-yard pass from Katelyn Erhardsen, Pringle had a nearly open field to land her second goal of the game, and secure SFU’s lead for the night.
But the pressure was far from off at this point in the game. With her second assist of the game, Katelyn Erhardsen helped Claire Bareilles clinch the final goal for SFU. A freshman at SFU, this marks Bareilles’ first goal of her SFU career.
“I’m extremely proud of her,” head coach Annie Hamel told reporters at SFU Athletics. “She’s come close in so many games, so she was really excited and we’re all so happy for her.”
With a 3–0 lead in the last minutes of the game, SFU was safely ahead. Despite this, the Northwest girls never gave up, and pushed hard right until the end of the game.
This being SFU’s third win in a row, the team is enjoying their longest winning streak of the season. “I feel very happy,” said Hamel. “It’s good to see two back-to-back really strong performances. Our attack is really getting going, with eight goals in two games, and also two clean sheets.”
The Clan will next be travelling to Montana State University Billings, where they’ll be facing the Yellowjackets on October 5. After that, they’ll be heading to Portland, Oregon facing the Concordia Cavaliers on October 7.
