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Jayhawk Soccer Handles Oklahoma 3-0
NORMAN, Okla. – The University of Kansas soccer team tied its season-high by winning its sixth consecutive contest on Sunday, as the Jayhawks defeated Oklahoma, 3-0, at John Crain Field in Norman, Okla.
The win improves Kansas to 14-2-0 overall and 6-1 in Big 12 play, while Oklahoma drops to 6-6-3 and 2-5 in conference action. The loss was the worst of the season for Oklahoma, who had only lost by one goal in each of its previous five setbacks this season.
"We played well," said head coach Mark Francis. "In Friday's game, we had to play some people a lot of minutes, so we had some dead legs out there today and we had to use a lot of players. Our bench did well today, they came in and did a great job maintaining the intensity."
The Jayhawks got on the board in the 20th minute when senior midfielder Lauren Williams played the ball over to senior Monica Brothers, who finished the play for her first goal of the season. Later in the first half, junior
Jessica Smith scored her first goal in 11 games, as she took a feed from sophomore Nicole Cauzillo and beat Sooner goalkeeper Catherine Wade to send KU to the locker room up 2-0.
Kansas did not let up in the second half, as they added a goal in the game's 63rd minute to take a 3-0 advantage. On the play, junior forward Caroline Smith took a pass from sophomore defender Holly Gault and beat OSU's second goalie of the afternoon, Jennifer Nichols, one-on-one for the tally. The goal was the team-leading seventh of the season for Caroline Smith, who also leads the Jayhawks with 19 points.
"The most pleasing thing about today's game is that so far this year we have been a first half team and today we played really well in the second half," Francis said. "That was something we talked about at halftime and we actually played better in the second half than we did in the first, so I was happy about that."
Senior goalkeeper Meghan Miller made three saves in the contest to collect her Big-12 leading 10th shutout of the season. The Seattle, Wash., native, who has allowed only one goal in her last five games, lowered her conference-leading goals against average to 0.32.
Kansas soccer is back in action next weekend as they travel to College Station, Texas, to take on the Texas A&M Aggies and to Austin, Texas, to battle the Texas Longhorns.