Sept. 25, 2005
Columbia, S.C. – South Carolina freshman forward Alex Mouton scored two second half goals as South Carolina defeated Alabama 2-0 on Sunday afternoon at Stone Stadium in SEC women’s soccer action. The Gamecocks improve to 5-4 and 1-1 in conference play while the loss drops Alabama to 6-2-1 and 0-1-1 in the SEC.
“We stuck to our game plan and I think we were prepared for this match,” said USC head coach Shelley Smith. “The players learned from Friday, executed and continued to play through the match. The players that came off the bench really lifted us today. I don’t think that’s happened in the past few games. It was an overall great team effort.”
Carolina took advantage of play early in the first half and held an 8-3 edge on shots but the match remained a scoreless tie. USC would break through with its first goal on 55:26 with Mouton putting away her second goal of the season. USC senior midfielder Amanda Thurber found a breaking Courtney Cobbs down the right flank, who served up a ball from near the end lines towards the six yard box. The ball found Mouton breaking near the far post and the Columbia, S.C. native knocked a shot past Crimson Tide goalkeeper Kara Gudmens for a 1-0 Carolina lead.
The Gamecocks remained ahead by one goal until the 85th minute when Mouton put in her second goal of the match. Cobbs broke past an Alabama defender inside the 18 and again found Mouton near the far post, where she put in another goal to seal the win for Carolina.
“That’s the job of a forward, to be in the right place at the right time and pick up anything they can,” said USC head coach Shelley Smith. “She did a great job to finish when we needed to finish after not doing that Friday night.”
Mouton’s two goals give her three on the season and tie her with Darcel Mollon for the team lead in goals scored. South Carolina finished the afternoon leading in shots for the eighth consecutive game with a 13-8 advantage. Carolina also had eight corner kicks.
“For a majority of the time we played our game,” said Coach Smith. “We did what we needed to do to neutralize their attack and attack them in areas we knew we had some space. Courtney Cobbs did an excellent job pulling them out on the right, breaking them down and getting balls in the box. She served two great goals and that was the difference. I give her a lot of credit.”
Cobbs earned assists on both goals and is now the team leader in that category with five for the season. Sophomore goalkeeper Lindsay Thorstenson made three saves in all 90 minutes of play to earn her fourth win of the season and her second shutout. Gudmens had five saves for Alabama.
“It feels great to win and I was able to take advantage of the hard work from my teammates,” said Alex Mouton. “We wanted to come out at the beginning of the season with a win, unfortunately we had a tough loss to open it but I think that motivated us to play our game today and get a win.”
South Carolina will now head on the road for its next two conference matches with a Friday night tilt at Georgia starting at 7 p.m. ET. Carolina will also face Tennessee next weekend on Sunday, Oct. 2 at 2 p.m. ET with the match broadcast on CSS-TV.
