Oct. 22, 2006
Fayetteville, Ark. – Freshman forward Samantha Diaz-Matosas scored her second goal of the season as South Carolina tied Arkansas 1-1 on Sunday afternoon in SEC women’s soccer action. The tie moves Carolina’s record to 11-5-3 and 5-2-3 in the SEC while the Lady Backs’ record moves to 10-5-2 and 3-4-2 in the conference. With Sunday’s tie, South Carolina has secured a berth into the SEC Tournament. Carolina closes out the regular season on Friday, Oct. 29 hosting Florida at 7 pm at Stone Stadium.
“We didn’t create many chances this afternoon and didn’t play very well but we were able to battle and come away with a tie,” said USC head coach Shelley Smith. “There was effort but we couldn’t really get control of the match. Arkansas possessed well and did a good job to create an attack against us. We weathered some storms and managed to find the goal in the second half to tie the match.”
Arkansas would go ahead first with a quick goal to the start of Sunday’s match in the third minute of play. Katie Hamilton would take a touch from the top of the box and knock a goal in from 20 yards out and past Carolina keeper Laura Armstrong. South Carolina would tie the match early into the second half at the 56th minute of play with Diaz-Matosas scoring on a header goal off a cross from Erin Geldhof.
“It wasn’t a good start for us giving up a goal very early in the match,” said Coach Smith. “Samantha did a good job to score in the second half and tie the match for us. It was a good diagonal ball played in by Geld and Samantha finished the chance.”
The match would remain a stalemate the rest of the way despite both team creating chances in the second half and in both overtimes. Arkansas would finish with a 21-9 shot advantage and an 8-1 edge in corner kicks. Arkansas had eight shots on goal to the Gamecocks six as well. Kim Miller and Ashley Kirk each had two shots on goal to lead the USC attack. Christina Burger had three for the Lady Backs. Armstrong would finish with seven saves in goal for the Gamecocks while Carrie Dillsaver finished with five for Arkansas.
With an SEC tournament berth secured, the Gamecocks will enter the final match of the regular season with the Gators with a lot to play for as teams fight to secure a seed for the November tournament in Orange Beach, Ala. USC will also put its undefeated 8-0-2 home record on the line against the nationally ranked Gators.
“It’s a matter of pride for our team to defend our home field and to finish the year undefeated at home would be a great accomplishment,” said Coach Smith. “Florida is a great team and has been at the top of the conference most of the season. We are at a stage where we are still trying to prove that we are a strong team and that we can play with anyone in the country.”
Live audio broadcast and live gametracker stats for Friday’s match will be available at uscsports.com. Friday is also Senior Night with the Gamecocks honoring seniors M.A. Foster and Erin Geldhof before the match.
