Georgia Bulldog soccer 1 – 1 on the weekend against Gators and Gamecocks
After rolling through the opening month of the season, the Georgia Bulldog soccer team (7-2-1, 2-1-1) took it’s number 22 national ranking on the road with weekend games against Florida in Gainesville Friday and against South Carolina on Sunday in Columbia.
The 2014 Bulldogs demonstrated they are ready for primetime, playing the number 7 Gators tough in a tight 2 -1 loss and beating 14 ranked South Carolina 1-0.
Head coach Steve Holeman spoke to Georgiadogs.com.
"I think a lot of teams make the decision to come in and sit in on Florida and bunker, and we didn’t want to do that. We wanted to play them straight up, and we were pretty effective with that in the first half. We were tied at halftime, and we had some great opportunities to finish. From what I can remember, this is the first time I’ve seen Florida make an adjustment out of their system, and they did well with it. They switched to a 3-5-2 in the second half and it allowed them to get more of the ball, get more possession, and that changed the game a bit. Credit them – they made an adjustment, got a great opportunity, and finished."
Against the Gators on Friday, sophomore forward Marion Crowder scored the Dawg’s lone goal – her fifth in the last three games – on assists from Gabby Seiler and Rachel Garcia.
“We can certainly take some positives out of this,” Holeman said. “The girls played incredibly well. We need to regroup – we have a tough challenge ahead of us on Sunday with a travel day tomorrow. We’ll be back with some adjustments. We’ll be ready to go.”
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When the Dawgs arrived in Columbia on Sunday, they were ready.
Georgia scored just 15 seconds before halftime and used a gutsy second-half effort to hold on to beat South Carolina.
Freshman Kelsey Killean provided the game-winner for Georgia on her third goal of the season, with classmate Delaney Fechalos earning the assist in her first career appearance. It was Georgia’s first shutout of the 2014 SEC slate and fifth overall. The Bulldogs earned the victory despite playing the final 24 minutes down a player following a red card on Marion Crowder.
“Without question, today was a day of survival,” said head coach Steve Holeman to Georgiadogs.com. “On the road against a top-20 team, we had so many things we had to fight. We played well for the first 20-25 minutes, and after that the edge was to them, no question. Our goal came against the run of play. In the second half, our goal was to not get stuck in our half, and before the red card, we actually were already getting peppered by South Carolina. They took it to us. Once the red card came, it was a matter of sitting in and weather the storm, and we did that.”
Killean put Georgia on top in the 45th minute, beating the South Carolina defenders to a long ball up from Fechalos on the back line. Killean one-timed it on the bounce past the keeper and into the back of the net for the 1-0 lead. Despite 15 Gamecock shots on the day, Georgia was able to weather the storm and hang on for the 1-0 road victory to bring the three points back to Athens.