After five straight losses, four of which came against conference opponents, the University of Richmond women’s soccer team picked up its elusive first Atlantic 10 win 2-1 over St. Bonaventure University Oct. 1.
On several occasions this season, the Spiders have had a lead in the second half of play but allowed their opponents to get back into the game, ultimately resulting in losses. This time around, however, the team fought back from a 1-0 deficit in the first half and came back to secure its first victory in almost a month.
“It’s good to finally get a win,” UR Head Coach Adam Denton said. “We’ve been working hard and competing and been unfortunate in a couple games. We didn’t play particularly well in the first half, found ourselves 1-0 down, which is disappointing, but we wanted a response in the second half, and I felt that we played a lot better in the second half and pushed forward and got those two goals and a well-earned victory.”
In the first half, UR got some early shots but could not find the back of the net. The Spiders even set up three corner kicks almost 30 minutes into gameplay but could not execute anything to start off the game.
The Bonnies eventually struck first, scoring off a penalty kick just over 30 minutes into the first half and shifting the momentum to St. Bonaventure to close out the first 45 minutes in the match.
The second half, though, belonged to the Spiders.
Coming out of the halftime gates, UR showed its fight to close the gap and attempt to tie things up. The team had three shots through the first 15 minutes of the second half.
“I think that we met as a group at halftime and kind of realized that our performance in the first half could’ve definitely been better, and we worked through those challenges, and we were able to make a couple changes, and through the score you could see that helped,” graduate forward Molly Wierman said.
Just under 12 minutes into half two, Wierman scored off a free kick and tied things up 1-1. This was Wierman’s fourth goal on the year. She has totaled 11 goals in her collegiate career.
Things did not stay tied for long, as four minutes later a UR shot was blocked by St. Bonaventure’s goalkeeper but then headed in by senior midfielder Hannah Antonick, her second goal of the season. First-year defender Gwen Howell was credited with the assist.
“Yes, I think I was in the right place at the right time,” Antonick said. “It was a lot of hard work from my teammates around me getting to the position that I was able to score the goal, and I think it was overdue.”
From there, the Spiders were able to hold off the Bonnies to pick up their first A-10 win and bring their record to 3-7-3 on the year.
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It was a physical match, as there were 11 fouls and a yellow card on the Bonnies’ side and 10 fouls on UR’s side.
UR and St. Bonaventure each had 12 shots during the game and had six shots on goal. The Spiders had the edge with saves as senior goalkeeper Taylor Montague had five on the day. Montague has 46 saves through 12 games this season.
UR’s next game is against Saint Louis University at 2 p.m. Oct. 8, beginning a two-game road stretch before returning to President’s Field Oct. 15.
“Obviously from our score, we haven’t had the best of luck in the past couple of games, but I think that this win really will help us move forward for the rest of our conference games and we really deserve this today, so we’re happy,” Wierman said.
Contact sports editor Jimmy James at jimmy.james@richmond.edu
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