MOSCOW, Idaho ? In what turned out to be an all-around sloppy game, the Vandal soccer team dropped a 2-1 overtime match to Cal State Bakersfield on very windy day at Guy Wicks Field on Sunday and slipped to 3-2 on the season.
“Hopefully we got that out of our system,” Showler said. “Now we need to get out on the practice field and get back to doing the things that we do well.”
After the teams battled to a 1-1 tie in regulation, Bakersfield's Moriah Neville fired a deep shot that slid just off Idaho keeper Anna Sandman's fingertips into the right corner of the goal for the win.
The Vandal women came out of the blocks slow and seemed to be a step behind the ?Runners on every loose ball. Showler also said that the team let Bakersfield take them out of their game.
“We've got to get it down and play and we didn't do that today,” Showler said. “We looked flat and we were second to every ball.
“We didn't do enough today to deserve to win it.”
The Vandals started the game on less than ideal conditions with 20-mph winds blowing in their faces for the first half. Those winds contributed to Bakersfield's first goal, as Sandman misjudged a long shot, courtesy of a strong tailwind.
“The game was dictated by the wind, which we couldn't control,” Showler said. “We've got to get back to doing what we do well, which is playing soccer.”
Junior Britta Rustad helped Idaho get on the board at the 30:36 mark when she knocked ahead a nice pass and freshman Anna Edmonds beat the keeper to it for her second score of the year. Rustad earned her second assist of the season.
The Vandals had a few other good scoring opportunities, but had shots get deflected and miss wide.
The offense that was prevalent in Idaho's 2-0 victory over Portland State on Thursday was absent for the most of the game on Sunday. Vandal players got the ball into the Bakersfield zone, but couldn't create enough shot opportunities.
The bright spot for the Vandal women is that they scored their seventh goal of the season. Last year, the team only scored seven all year long and Showler made scoring the biggest point of emphasis for the team.
Through just five games, the team also has 38 shots on goal, while last year's squad had just 71 in 19 games. At the current rate, the team is on pace to have 137 shots on goal.
The Vandal women will now prepare for another road trip as they play the next four away from the Palouse. Next weekend they will face Texas-El Paso on Friday and North Dakota State at the UTEP Border Shootout. They face Loyola Marymount in Los Angeles and Oregon State in Corvallis the following weekend before returning home for a three match homestand.
