On Thursday night, the Golden Hurricane women’s soccer team welcomed the Temple Owls to town as their opponent on senior night.
The early minutes of the game looked promising for Tulsa, as the Owls had trouble with their passing. However, they quickly fixed that issue, and started to push back to even out the midfield play.
Twenty minutes in, Elana Falcone found herself open on the right half of the Tulsa defense, and was able to chip the ball over goalkeeper Courtney McKeon for a goal from a tough angle, giving the Owls the lead.
The Golden Hurricane had trouble getting their offense going for much of the game, and, as time was winding down, it looked as though senior night was going to end in disappointment. Tulsa was resilient, however, and upped the pressure on Temple’s defense.
With just five minutes left in the game, Kajal Parmar was fouled outside the top of the box. Rachel Thun took a quick free kick, slotting the ball past the Owls goalkeeper to knot the score.
Momentum on their side, Tulsa pushed forward again. A mere two minutes later, Roman Edwards centered the ball and Thun was there to take a nice touch around a defender and beat the goalkeeper for the second time.
Senior night ended on a positive note after the incredible comeback, as the Golden Hurricane earned the 2–1 victory.
On Sunday afternoon, the Golden Hurricane faced their second ranked opponent of the season, No. 15 UConn.
In the earlygoing, UConn lived up to their rank. Their passes were sharp, and they pushed Tulsa back deep into their own half.
The Huskies first opportunity came quickly, as their leading scorer Rachel Hill got her head to a cross, forcing McKeon into a diving save.
Tulsa slowly started to get their footing, and pushed forward more. Tana Dake found herself with a sole defender between her and the goal.
She faked the defender out, and sent a shot over the goalkeeper into the corner of the goal at the 25 minute mark, putting the Golden Hurricane in the lead.
Near halftime, Tulsa had multiple chances to extend their lead. First, Thun crossed it in to Christina Holmes who put a shot off the goalpost.
In the next minute Thun broke away behind the Huskies’ defensive line and was tripped up by the goalkeeper, earning a penalty kick.
Thun took the kick, but the goalkeeper guessed correctly and was able to make the save. The score remained 1–0 going into the break.
In the second half, UConn was quick to find an equalizer. Andrea Plucenik scored from short range five minutes into the half to force the tie.
The remainder of the second half played out without another goal, so the game headed into overtime.
Neither team lacked quality chances in the overtime period. UConn’s came first, as Plucenik hit the post, and McKeon was able to grab the rebound to prevent another shot.
Tulsa’s best chance came when the Huskies were complaining about a foul call, and the Golden Hurricane quickly played the ball in behind the defense that wasn’t paying attention, but unfortunately weren’t able to convert.
In the second overtime period, the Huskies sent a hard driven shot off of the crossbar, and then were able to get the game-winning goal from Samantha McGuire as she poked the ball past McKeon.
With the split games, Tulsa’s record now stands at 12–4–1 (3–3–1 American Athletic Conference).
The Golden Hurricane have two more regular season games on their schedule against East Carolina this Friday afternoon in Greenville, N.C. and in Cincinnati on Sunday afternoon to wrap up conference play.
In the first week of November the women’s team will look to take their first American Athletic Conference title in Dallas, and with it a berth to the NCAA tournament.
