The San Diego State women’s soccer team (9-8-4, 6-2-3 MW) faced top-seeded Boise State (16-3-2, 8-1-2 MW) in the Mountain West Tournament semifinals on Wednesday, Nov. 6 at the SDSU Sports Deck. The Aztecs finish their season with a loss against the Broncos with a 3-2 score.
Defender Grace Goins talked about the positives and the challenges of the match against the Broncos.
“It was a good game, it was a battle to the very end so that always keeps everyone’s energy up,” Goins said. “A con, I think would be losing and we’re losing a lot of our seniors so that’s hard.”
From the start of the match, both teams were playing aggressively and no foul calls were being called on either side.
On the 31-minute mark, Goins scored the first goal for the Aztecs, assisting defender Trinity Coker.
Head coach Mike Friesen talked about the team’s performance in the first half.
“I thought in the first half we were quite good,” Friesen said. “Weathered the storm a little bit in the first 10 minutes and then got down to business and I thought we were quite good. Kind of got to control the game, got the goal, created a bunch of chances.”
By halftime, the Scarlet and Black were up 1-0.
Friesen discussed what he talked about with the team during halftime.
“I thought the first 10 minutes we were just not on the front foot,” Friesen said. “I said ‘We have to come out on the front foot and push them back a little bit because their whole game is dependent on kind of trying to bully you and push balls behind you.’”
Starting the second half, the Broncos took over as senior forward defender Carly Cross scored the 48-minute mark.
The game was getting quiet once again but the Broncos wanted to continue their momentum. At the 75-minute mark forward defender Sophie Schmautz scored the last goal for the Broncos.
The goal left the Aztecs trailing down by two, 3-1.
Two minutes later at the 77-minute mark, a miracle happened for the Aztecs. Forward Kali Trevithick scored a goal, assisted by Coker.
Despite the goal, with 13 minutes left of the match, the Aztecs couldn’t find the net.
Friesen talked about how difficult the season was for the team.
“Overall for the season, it’s been a really hard season because we had such an older team and a lot of experienced players who won a championship last year and so expectations were really high, and then a combination of injuries and a difficult schedule really put us in a tough spot mid-season,” Friesen said.
By the end of the match, the Aztecs were outshot with 18 while the Broncos had 19. The Broncos committed 12 fouls, while the Aztecs had 9.
Senior goalkeeper Alexa Madueño had a total of four saves.
Goins mentioned the 2024 season and reflected on her teammates.
“The season went great,” Goins said. “We started off a little rough and it took our entire team to rally around each other to end the way we did and I couldn’t be prouder of our entire team.”
The Broncos move to the championship game against Utah State at the SDSU Sports Deck on Saturday, Nov. 9 against Utah State at 6 p.m.
Even though the season concluded with this loss, Friesen was able to talk about the team’s progress throughout the season and the team’s special bond.
“One of the things that I’m most proud of the group is what they did the end of September on where a lot of teams would just fold and not play well and not play hard and kind of phone it in,” Friesen said. “ I thought they did a really good job of just changing the season by sticking in together but also creating a culture that’s within the team that they were just down for each other.”
