It took until the waning minutes of the team’s second game of the fall, but head coach Brendan Faherty and the Stony Brook women’s soccer team finally scored a goal this season.
Senior striker Raven Edwards netted a shot in the 74th minute, tying the match late against visiting Sacred Heart to earn a 1-1 draw on Sunday afternoon.
The Seawolves had a lopsided advantage over the Pioneers in possession throughout the match, taking 20 shots to their opponents’ seven.
But despite Stony Brook’s dominance on offense, Sacred Heart struck first on a counter-attack in the 14th minute. Pioneers’ sophomore forward Melanie DaSilva passed left to sophomore midfielder Danielle Karpiej on a “give-and-go” breakout play. Karpiej drew the attention of the Seawolves defenders and returned a pass to DaSilva, who stepped into the box and gave the road team an early lead.
DaSilva’s goal was the second of her career at Kenneth P. LaValle Stadium, as she also scored in Sacred Heart’s 2-0 win over Stony Brook last season.
The Seawolves had a 12-1 lead in corner kick opportunities, nearly scoring on a number of the chances.
Off of one such corner-kick try, in the 57th minute, junior midfielder Sam Goodwin hit the crossbar on a shot from the left flank. The rebound bounced to Edwards in front of the net, where she appeared to score on a header, only for the goal to be nullified on an offsides call.
But the first-team all-conference forward soon made amends.
Seventeen minutes later, Stony Brook junior midfielder Christen Cahill pushed a pass through the center of the field that split the Sacred Heart defense. Edwards took possession of the ball in stride and booted it to the bottom-right corner of the net, the 19th goal of her career.
Goodwin had a chance, off another corner kick, to win the game for the Seawolves in the 88th minute, but sophomore goalkeeper Nicole Sambucco made a critical stop for the Pioneers, one of her eight saves in the match.
The game proceeded to overtime for the second time in three days, but both teams’ offensive efforts proved fruitless and the scoreboard buzzer sounded over a draw.
Stony Brook will be back in action on Thursday at 7 p.m., when the team kicks off a four-game road trip at Boston College in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts.
