Jenna Larson
Idaho State University Sports Information
Pocatello, Idaho – The Idaho State soccer team fell to vising UTEP 2-1 in double-overtime on a blistering Sunday afternoon at Davis Field.
“The good thing about this game is that we finally put ourselves in a position to win,” Head Coach Allison Gibson said. “We hadn’t done that in the last few games, so that was an advancement today. Of course we wanted to get the result, and that’s important. At the end of the day, it still hurts. I think the good thing was that we put ourselves in a situation, we took tons of shots on goal and we got our offense back into the game.”
Idaho State (1-4-0) took a season-high 32 shots with a season-high 10 shots on goal in the game, led by sophomore midfielder Makena Bambei with a career-high nine shots on goal. Multiple Bengals recorded a shot in the game, and six different players took a shot on goal. Yet, ISU also gave up 19 shots to UTEP (1-5-0), second only to Michigan, six of which were on goal.
The first half was quiet for both teams, with neither squad scoring off multiple attempts in the first 45. Idaho State fired off 12 shots, five on goal, but UTEP’s Alyssa Palacios saved each shot on goal. ISU’s Shawna Hennings also recorded a shutout in the first 45, collecting four saves in the first.
In the second half, UTEP’s Anna Jimmerson broke away in the 52nd minute to score and put the Miners up 1-0. But ISU’s Bambei responded in the 63rd minute, firing a shot from about 18 yards out from center field past UTEP’s goalkeeper Palacios for her first career goal.
“Bambei has one of the most wicked shots on this team,” Gibson said. “[In her first few shots], she was just miss-hitting it, like a golf shot. I just kept telling her, ‘Just keep taking them.’… For her to step up and bury that thing, to get it stuck in the back of the net, that was brilliant.”
Both teams were held scoreless in the final 27 minutes of regulation and the first 10 minutes of overtime. UTEP found an opening in the 103rd minute as Vic Bohdan found Cayla Payne in traffic to put the ball in the back of the net for the game winner.
“The advancement this team makes from one game to the next is tremendous, and we are continuing to progress in the right directions,” Gibson said. “They trained really hard yesterday, so to come out and give that overtime performance and to play that well to get our offense back on the board was tremendous, and I was really proud of them for that.”
Idaho State returns to play on Tuesday, Sept. 5 as the Bengals host visiting Hawai’i at 4 p.m. at Davis Field.
