Amelia Parreira
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After a two-game slump, the Cal Poly women’s soccer team (7-8-0, 2-2-0 Big West Conference) shut out Hawai’i (6-8-0, 1-3-0 Big West) by a score of 2-0 on Sunday at Alex G. Spanos Stadium.
“Winning’s always good,” head coach Alex Crozier said. “Today we had the opportunity to score four or five (goals) and we got two in.”
Bouncing back from Friday’s 2-0 loss to UC Davis, Cal Poly’s offense soared on Sunday, totaling 18 shots in the game. In the 11th minute, freshman defender Gianna Rosati tapped a header off senior midfielder Krystal Pascua into the goal to put the Mustangs on the board.
“I feel like we kind of got shafted in the last game, (so) it pays off,” junior goalkeeper Alyssa Giannetti said.
In the 18th minute, junior forward Elise Krieghoff, assisted by senior midfielder Sara Lancaster, scored her 11th goal of the season, bringing Cal Poly to an early 2-0 lead. Krieghoff made a total of seven shots throughout the game.
Cal Poly’s defense put up a wall as well. Giannetti tallied four saves and accounted for all but one of Cal Poly’s five team saves. With temperatures rising, tensions rose among players in the last minutes of the game. After a yellow card to Rosati in the 86th minute, an argument broke out between her and Hawai’i’s sophomore forward Kama Pascua. The heat and frustration were mostly to blame for that, according to Krieghoff.
“(Hawai’i) gets scrappy as the game goes on,” Krieghoff said. “We just managed the game and managed (Pascua).”
Cal Poly next plays rival UC Irvine at 7 p.m. on Oct. 17.