Rutgers women's soccer secures Big Ten Tournament appearance with win over Northwestern
The Rutgers women's soccer team hosted Northwestern in its final match of the regular season on Sunday. The Scarlet Knights (9-6-3, 5-4-1) honored their seniors with a Senior Day celebration prior to the game. Rutgers defeated the Wildcats (9-5-4, 3-5-2) by a score of 2-1 and locked its spot in the Big Ten Tournament.
The game started a bit sloppy for both teams. Approximately 20 minutes into the match, there hadn't been many real scoring threats from either side. Instead, there were many careless passes and lots of back-and-forth up and down the pitch.
Northwestern launched its first shot attempt of the day on the Knights in the 24th minute. The counterattack from Rutgers looked promising following the miss, but the defense booted away a last-second pass from senior forward Allison Lowrey to a free-running teammate.
The offense was still lacking for both sides until the 33rd minute when the Knights got the game's first shot on goal and made it count as they found the back of the net. Senior midfielder Sara Brocious scored the goal, assisted by Lowrey and freshman forward Ashley Baran.
Rutgers held onto the lead for the rest of the first half and went into the locker room up 1-0. The Knights led 4-2 in shots in the opening half.
The Wildcats dominated the possession to begin the second half, putting loads of pressure on Rutgers and redshirt freshman goalkeeper Olivia Bodmer. Bodmer then made an excellent leaping save on a powerful Northwestern shot attempt in the 50th minute to keep the Knights ahead.
Rutgers couldn't hold the Wildcats' attack for much longer as Josie Aulicino fired an impressive goal into the top right corner of the goal past Bodmer in the 57th minute. The game was now level at 1-1.
Things remained tied until the 77th minute when Baran received an excellent through pass from senior midfielder and forward Sam Kroeger and drove in a powerful shot past the Northwestern goalkeeper. The Knights held the lead with less than 15 minutes left in the match.
The Wildcats held much of the possession in the final 10 minutes of play while Rutgers held its breath, doing everything possible to prevent the equalizer.
With approximately a minute left to play, junior back Emily Mason left with an injury. With Mason being one of the top defenders for the Knights, losing her with the 1-goal lead in the final moments wasn't ideal. Regardless, they were able to hold on for the victory.
Despite the honoring of the seniors in the match, it was Baran, the freshman, who came up huge for Rutgers. She tallied 1 goal and an assist, with the late goal being the ultimate deciding factor in this game.
"I made my run early, and I saw the ball coming through, and I was just like, 'I need to start running,'" said Baran. "Once I picked up the ball, I went right to the goal, and I was just like, 'I can't miss this one.'"
Now locked in as the sixth seed in the Big Ten Tournament with a tiebreaker over Ohio State, Baran and the Knights will prepare to travel and face No. 3-seeded Wisconsin.
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