BOULDER, Colo. – Jessica Raybe and McKenzie Berryhill both scored goals to lead the Arizona State women's soccer team to a 2-1 win over Colorado on Sunday.
With the win the Sun Devils (8-8-1, 4-5-1 Pac-12) have now recorded wins in four of their last five games and will have the opportunity to go over the .500 mark when they play at Arizona in Friday's regular-season finale.
“Today was a battle,” ASU head coach Kevin Boyd said. “Colorado is a good team and they were playing with emotion today because it was their Senior Day and then we were trying to make up for (Friday's loss at Utah).
Raybe got the Sun Devils off to a great start in the seventh minute when she took a pass from Aly Moon and fired a shot into the top left corner from seven yards out that beat a diving effort by Colorado goalkeeper Kate Scheele. For Raybe, it was her fifth goal of the season and her fourth in ASU's last six games.
The Devils would extend their lead to 2-0 in the 59th minute on a goal by Berryhill. Senior Cali Farquharson started the series of plays that led to the goal when she hit Berryhill with a pass in stride as Berryhill was going toward goal. Berryhill attempted a sliding shot at the six, but Scheele slid into Berryhill in an attempt to smother the shot attempt. The ball squirted loose and Scheele jumped up and attempted to jump back on the ball but before she could Moon raced in to gain possession. Moon quickly set the ball and then sent a cross back into the box where Berryhill was wide open for the header to give ASU a two-goal advantage.
“I love that we went up 2-0,” Boyd said. “We had a real good goal by Jessica Raybe that she put away and then another one that Kenny got. The ball got delivered in and it was a 50-50 ball with the keeper and Kenny slid and the keeper made a nice play blocking it out. The great thing is that Aly Moon followed, collected the loose ball, chipped the ball in the middle and Kenny headed it in.”
Boyd said that Moon's propensity for never giving up on plays was a contributing factor on Berryhill's goal.
“It's a sign of a goal scorer, the ones who get around the ball in the box and find the loose balls,” Boyd explained. “A major trait is they follow everything because good things sometimes happen for you: A defender mishits it, the keeper misplays it, it hits a post and comes out. There are so many little things that can occur and she just always follows and that's why she is able to make those plays.”
The Buffaloes (7-9-3, 1-7-2) got on the board in the 74th minute when Heather Ward headed in a free kick to cut ASU's advantage to 2-1.
As the minutes ticked away the Buffaloes started to press their attack, but the Sun Devils would turn back their efforts to come away with the win.
“We had talked about what teams are going to do when they are losing late in the game and how we are going to handle it when they change systems,” Boyd said. “I thought we did a better job sorting out the system today when it changed late. We were putting pressure on their backs so they could not serve easy balls out. I also thought we did a great job of eliminating their goalkeeper's ability to serve the ball to the other 18.”
The Sun Devils conclude the regular season on Friday (6 p.m MT) when they travel to Tucson, Arizona, to take on Arizona in the annual Territorial Cup matchup.
