Soccer wins C-USA title
In just its fifth season, the soccer team won its first conference championship Sunday, defeating UTEP 3-0 in the Conference USA tournament final at Rice Track/Soccer Stadium. Head coach Chris Huston said she considers Sunday’s victory — which gave the team its second consecutive NCAA tournament berth — influential in the long run.
“Some former players were at the game yesterday, and one of them was just in absolute tears — they were tears of joy,” Huston said. “Winning a conference championship was a huge step for the program. It will pay off in recruiting. We’ve already gotten tons of e-mails from recruits all over the country who saw [the final] live on national television.”
The third-seeded Owls won the championship without facing either top-seeded University of Central Florida or second-seeded Southern Methodist University, since both teams were upset before they would have faced Rice.
“We didn’t just get lucky — I think we were meant to win it,” senior defender Erin Droeger said. “We beat SMU during the regular season, and we didn’t play well against UCF at their field — had we played them at home, I think we would have beaten them.”
Sunday’s championship was a rematch for the Owls and Miners. Rice defeated UTEP 3-1 in Houston Oct. 23. Entering Sunday’s final, the Owls had won their last four games against the Miners, and Huston said she hoped to use that history to Rice’s advantage.
“Going into the game, I told our team to get in [UTEP’s] heads with an early goal so [they would] be thinking, ‘Here we go again,’” Huston said.
Rice did just that when freshman forward Anne Candee scored in the third minute, and the Owls dominated the first half, controlling the game and taking eight corner kicks to UTEP’s zero. But Rice could not add to its lead on any of these chances and went to halftime ahead 1-0.
Junior midfielder Maria Fadool said UTEP changed its formation in the second half to attempt to counter the Owls.
“We had three center midfielders to their two and they didn’t come in at all on us, so we had an advantage in the middle — that proved to be vital for us in maintaining possession,” Fadool said. “In the middle of the second half, though, they changed to our formation because they just weren’t able to compete.”
However, Rice still managed to control the game and added a second goal midway through the second half. A cross from the left side was too long and went over the heads of the Rice forwards and UTEP defenders, but junior midfielder Vanessa Serrano ran the ball down
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