The San Diego State women’s soccer team is hosting the Mountain West Tournament this year at the SDSU Sports Deck.
The Aztecs (9-7-4, 6-2-3 MW) finished the regular season in fourth place.
The scarlet and black played against the fifth-seeded University of Nevada, Las Vegas (7-11-2, 5-5-1 MW) on Sunday, Nov. 3, in the first round of the tournament. The game concluded with an Aztec win against the Rebels on a 3-1 score.
The Aztecs set the tone early, with senior midfielder Denise Castro scoring a header in the first 72 seconds of the match. The goal gave an assist to senior defender Trinity Coker.
Although the Rebels were coming at the Aztecs real tight, the Aztecs turned up the heat. Senior forward Kali Trevithick scored a goal at the 15-minute mark from the right-high corner of the goal.
Later in the first half, at the 36-minute mark, the Rebels scored a goal to trail behind the Aztecs 2-1. The goal was scored by freshman midfielder Tori Martinez, who gave an assist to sophomore midfielder Trinity Buchanan and redshirt junior defender Torie Reardon.
Head coach Mike Friesen mentioned what he talked about to the team at halftime.
“One thing I said at halftime is like, ‘we want to slow the game down a little bit and connect passes but I don’t want you to shut down like we still have to be intense defensively. We have to make sure we’re doing all the right things,’” Friesen said.
The Aztecs secured the win with the final goal of the match being scored 92 seconds into the second half. The goal was scored by Trevithick and gave an assist to senior forward Emma Gaines-Ramos.
Trevithick mentioned what was going through her mind when she scored the two goals.
“I just took my shots (and) tried to not get too excited before I shot because I’ve been having some finishing struggles all season,” Trevithick said.
Friesen talked about Trevithick’s second goal and how it set off the mood for the remainder of the match.
“It calmed it down a little bit, gave us a chance to be able to pass the ball, change point of attack (and) stay a little more connected,” Friesen said.
The Aztecs attempted 17 shots with eight of those being shots on goal, while the Rebels had 10 shots with four being shots on goal.
The Aztecs also had 10 fouls to the Rebels 12.
The Aztecs’ senior goalkeeper Alexa Madueño had a total of three saves. Friesen talked about Madueño’s contribution this season.
“She’s just been phenomenal this year,” Friesen said about Madueño’s performance. “When we were in the middle of the season and struggling she was keeping us in games. She’s come up with massive saves…She’s just a rock and so like that helps us settle into the game knowing she’s back there. She’s been a fantastic leader.”
Trevithick talked about what worked well facing UNLV.
“I guess we just executed the game plan,” Trevithick said. “We found pockets in the midfield and we came out strong from the first whistle (and) got an early goal. That really helped us get some momentum. We just kind of attacked, went up and hard.”
Trevithick also mentioned about the challenges they faced during the game.
“Some struggles we had I guess when we got scored on,” Trevithick said. “There’s always those moments after the goal. I think we responded well (and) just kept on playing our game, kept out cool and kept playing as a team.”
Following the win, the Aztecs will move on to the semifinals of the tournament where they will play against number one seed Boise State on Wednesday, Nov. 6 at the SDSU Sports Deck at 7 p.m.
“We were quite good against them in the game at Boise (and) I think the challenge for us is they’re very direct,” Friesen said. They’re gonna try and do the same thing to make the game chaos. So we’re gonna have to do a really good job of doing the same things we did tonight, of connecting passes, making sure we’re playing through them.”
