Temple Women’s Soccer walked into halftime against East Carolina Thursday night hoping for a boost. Temple goalkeeper Tasmin Bynoe had her hands full, facing 12 shots in the first 45 minutes and allowing two to find the back of the net.
Temple came out of the locker room looking for any form of a spark to chip into the two-goal deficit. Midfielder Carly Steinberg responded less than two minutes into the second half. She drilled her first goal in nearly two seasons to cut the Pirates’ deficit in half.
The Owls looked refreshed after the goal and increased their aggression, hoping to find the equalizer. In the 75th minute, they nearly found it. Temple midfielder Gabby Oudin sent a ball towards the net, but ECU goalkeeper Maeve English was able to corral it. Temple was unable to find another scoring chance in the final 15 minutes and the buzzer sounded on its second straight loss.
Temple (1-7, 0-1 American Athletic Conference) came up short against ECU (4-0-3, 1-0 AAC) 2-1 Thursday evening. The Owls could not make enough happen on offense in their first conference game of the season to extend their AAC losing streak to 22 games.
“We’re not a good enough team right now to think we can just out-soccer teams,” said Temple head coach Chris Shaw. “ECU has some good players and they play a good brand of soccer but they shouldn’t be outworking us.”
ECU came out of the gates swinging and overwhelmed the Owls to begin the first half. Temple midfielder Caroline Oestergaard gave her side life with a shot a minute into the contest, but it was saved. The chance was the only bright spot in the first half for Temple as the Pirates spent most of the first 45 minutes in the Owls’ third of the field.
The Pirates began their barrage on Bynoe in the sixth minute when a shot from forward Sydney Schnell ricocheted off the crossbar. The Pirates began to overload the Owls’ defense with two consecutive corners and a shot which banged off the post. The Pirates got through Bynoe’s brick wall in the 20th minute, but an offside negated the goal.
Bynoe stuffed two ECU goal opportunities in the 27th minute to keep the game level, but it was short lived. ECU forward Caitlen-Star Dolan Boodram had been lurking around the goal all evening and finally got a shot home four minutes after her first attempt was saved.
ECU added to its lead in the 45th minute when Pirates forward Samantha Moxie sent a screamer from outside the box to double the Pirates’ lead as the first half expired.
Steinberg opened the second half of the game by sending the ball past English for the only Temple goal of the night. The goal sparked some life into the Owls as they managed three shots with two being on target and limited the Pirates’ offensive to just four shots in the second half.
“We had the mentality that 2-0 is the most dangerous lead but we can come back,” Steinberg said. “We had a fire underneath us.”
Temple began to find life throughout the second half but it never came to fruition. Bynoe never let a shot get past her in the second half, but the offense crumbled under the pressure.
The Owls fired off eight shots all game but three of them found the hands of English and the rest never found the net to hold the Owls at bay as the game drew to a close.
“If we’re relentless like this every single game, putting the ball forward, we’re bound to score goals,” Bynoe said. “We’ve got some fantastic strikers and when they get in dangerous areas we finish it. [Navy] should be scared of that and be ready for a battle.”
The Owls will attempt to defend their home field once again when Navy (6-4, 0-0 AAC) visits North Broad on Sept. 15 at 1 p.m.
Be the first to comment