The Golden Hurricane women’s soccer team faced their first ranked opponent of the season on Thursday when they travelled to Tampa to take on No. 24 ranked USF.
The game was one of few games this year where the Golden Hurricane looked to be out-matched for the majority of the game. In the first half alone, they were out-shot 12–4. Despite their multitude of shots, though, USF wasn’t able to score for the first seventy minutes of the game.
After seventy minutes, though, Trudi Carter was left open after she received a square pass from Grace Adams, and slotted the ball into the left side of the goal.
Tulsa wasn’t able to produce a goal for the duration of the game, and Carter’s goal proved to be enough to earn the 1–0 victory for the Bulls. The Golden Hurricane were outshot 22–9, but goalkeeper Courtney McKeon had a strong game with seven saves to keep the game always within reach.
After the game, head coach Kyle Cussen said, “I was really proud of our energy and focus, and the fact that we are competing with top-25 teams really shows where our program is and how far we’ve come.”
On Sunday afternoon, Tulsa faced the other American Athletic Conference team in Florida, Central Florida.
The game started out rough for the Golden Hurricane, as they found themselves down after only four minutes. Carol Rodrigues gave the Knights an early header goal to take a quick lead.
For the second game in a row, Tulsa was out-shot by a significant margin. In the first half against the UCF, the Knights outshot the Golden Hurricane 14–9. Despite facing so many shots, Tulsa only faced a 1–0 deficit heading into halftime.
The Golden Hurricane came out strong in the beginning of the second half, and were able to knot the score after a minute when Lauren King found the back of the net.
The tie was short-lived, however, as Rodrigues answered to put the Knights back in the lead. Ashley Spivey added a goal for UCF, and they finished with a 3–1 win.
After the losses, the Golden Hurricane’s record is 11–3–1 (2–2–1 American Athletic Conference). They resume play on Thursday evening against Temple at 7:00 at Hurricane Stadium.
