It was just another day at the office for the Brockport Golden Eagles women’s soccer team. They blanked the Keuka Wolves 4-0 to record their fifth win of the season, all of which were shutouts.
“You know, it’s a big side of our game, trying to break the other team’s play up,” Brockport head coach Mike Idland said. “Even though our first half was super dominant in terms of how the flow of play went, we probably needed a little bit more quality in front of their goal. So that’s a little bit what we talked about at halftime…our team adjusted really well in the second half.”
The Golden Eagles were firing on all cylinders the entire game both offensively and defensively. They took 37 shots with 17 of them on goal and allowed Keuka to record just four shots, two of which were saved by Madeline McCrosson. All of Keuka’s shots came in the second half. McCrosson is coming off a week where she was named Empire 8 Co-Defensive Player of the Week.
“We work really hard at communicating and just working really well together on the field,” McCrosson said. “We’ve got a lot of people that can come in and make a good impact in the defensive line.”
Two of Brockport’s goals came from sophomores. Brianna Marino picked up her first of her collegiate career while Amelia Breton recorded her second of the year.
“We’re just all very connected,” Marino said. “All of us are very intertwined and we connect well as a team, and it just shows in games and it really works out.”
Brockport started off strong in the first few minutes of the game. They maintained possession of the ball in the offensive zone while Keuka struggled to clear the ball.
The Golden Eagles drew first blood to start things off. With a little over five minutes into the game, Marino curled a shot into the top right corner of the net from near the left corner of Keuka territory.
“I was just really surprised, and I didn’t even know it was going to go in,” Marino said. “It was more of a cross, hoping someone would get on the end of it, but I was really happy and really excited and the excitement from my teammates really meant a lot to me as well.”
The Wolves continued to struggle to move the ball into enemy territory for most of the first half. Although they made a few tackles to take possession of the ball, Brockport would steal the ball right back.
Brockport continued to apply the pressure on goalie Elianna Wilder as they tried to add insurance onto their lead. For the rest of the half, they took 15 more shots, but only six were on goal and they were all saved by Wilder.
Keuka was able to move the ball just outside of Brockport’s box with 32:18 expired in the first half. However, the Golden Eagles defense forced a turnover to move the ball out of their side of the field.
The Golden Eagles were off and running in the beginning of the second half. Jaylah Cossin took a shot that trickled past Wilder to give Brockport a 2-0 lead. Brockport’s offense refused to stop scoring, as Breton buried a shot from inside of Keuka’s box to extend the lead.
Brockport continued to dominate in time in possession while being in enemy territory. Although the Wolves started to consistently get the ball into the offensive zone, Brockport’s defense was all over them and forced turnovers.
With 11:13 left in the second half, the Wolves took their first corner attempt of the game that was unsuccessful. Up to that point, Brockport made nine corner attempts.
Brockport added the cherry on top with a little under two minutes left in the game. A goal from McKenna Slate helped seal the 4-0 victory for the Golden Eagles.
Brockport moves to a 5-0-1 record on the season and now sits tied for first place in the Empire 8 with Alfred.
The Golden Eagles will hope to stay hot when they hit the road to take on Hilbert on Wednesday. The game is slotted to start at 4 p.m.
