An early second-half goal helped the Stony Brook women’s soccer team gain its first conference point as a member of the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA).
After their final non-conference game against Manhattan last Thursday, the Seawolves (3-5-2) hosted the William & Mary Tribe (4-4-2) at Kenneth P. LaValle Stadium on Sept. 22 in their conference opener. Though the first half was lackluster for Stony Brook following a William & Mary goal, the Seawolves responded early with a goal to open up the second half, leading to a 1-1 tie.
The Tribe controlled possession for most of the first half and drew first blood in the 36th minute after forward Ivey Crain scored off an assist from forward Elaina Longjohn. After trailing at the half, Stony Brook played much better coming out of the locker room. Just under two minutes into the second half, they produced a corner kick. Stony Brook then proceeded to fire off a flurry of shots. After shots by forward Lucianna Setteducate and midfielder Linn Beck, forward Reilly Rich tied the game with a goal off of an assist from defender Kerry Pearson.
Neither team could find the scoreboard for the remainder of regulation, leading to Stony Brook’s second straight 1-1 draw.
“I just challenged them at halftime a little bit,” head coach Tobias Bischof said in a postgame interview with The Statesman. “I told them that we just need to play with a little bit more confidence and I think that’s the difference. There’s a couple people who just need to want the ball a little bit more and we did that in the second half and that changed our game for the better.”
The Stony Brook defense kept themselves in the game led by standout performances from Pearson along with defenders Morayo Adenegan and Catherina von Drigalski. Goalkeeper Nicolette Pasquarella played the entire game and totaled seven saves.
The Stony Brook offense generated a total of nine shots with four on goal. William & Mary outshot Stony Brook with a total of 15 shots, eight of which landed on goal. After a lackluster first half that saw the Stony Brook offense fail to generate much of anything, Stony Brook bounced back quickly and were able to get themselves back into the game.
“I think we saw two different halves,” Bischof said. “I thought in the first half, I wasn’t really happy with our performance. In the second half, I thought we did a much better job. I thought the second half was much better than the first half.”
Rich leads the Stony Brook offense with a total of five goals. For William & Mary, Crain continues to impress in her freshman season, scoring her fourth goal of the season in this game.
With conference play now underway, the two teams received one point each in the standings.
Stony Brook will remain at home for its next conference game at Kenneth P. LaValle Stadium on Sunday, Sept. 25 at 12 p.m. The Seawolves will take on the Hampton Pirates, who recently traveled to Hofstra on Thursday evening and were blown out 8-0.
