Irish Women Drop Hoosiers On Pitch
NOTRE DAME – Despite a season-high seven saves from goalkeeper Sarah Stone, the Indiana Women’s Soccer team fell to No. 13 Notre Dame on Friday night, 2-0.
“Sarah absolutely kept us in the game,” said Indiana head coach Amy Berbary. “She had a couple of point-blank saves for us. Again, her leadership back there is more than we could ask for.”
The Fighting Irish came out aggressively to start the game as Notre Dame recorded four shots in the first 15 minutes of action, including an on-target look by Anna Gilbertson.
Notre Dame capitalized on its offensive looks in the 22nd minute as Natalie Jacobs picked up a cross from Gilbertson and sent in the ball to the top left corner to record the first score of the game.
Indiana looked to respond just seven minutes later as the Hoosiers picked up a corner kick, but the Irish cleared it to preserve the lead.
Veronica Ellis registered the lone Indiana shot of the first period in the 34th minute on a wide look.
Notre Dame doubled its lead in the 64th minute as Kaleigh Olmsted scored from eight yards out on a shot that was predominately blocked from Stone’s view in the net. The assist on Olmsted’s score went to Sabrina Flores.
Five of Stone’s seven saves happened in the final 45 minutes as she faced 11 total Irish shots in the second half of play.
Redshirt junior Kayleigh Stiegerwalt did pose a threat for the Hoosiers late as she put up a pair of shots on goal. However, Notre Dame goalkeeper Kaela Little made diving stops on both looks.
“We went into halftime and tried to make a couple adjustments to try and get one back and against a top-ranked team like this you are going to get very few chances in each half,” said Berbary. “I thought we gave ourselves a chance a couple times and we just couldn’t get one to fall.”
Indiana returns to action on Sunday as they host Ball State at 5:30 p.m. in the final non-conference game of the season.
“We’ve just got to understand we played one of the best teams in the country tonight,” said Berbary. “So we need to take this sort of effort and the way we played tonight and fix the little details for Sunday.”
Sunday’s meeting will be Military Appreciation Day and will feature a dog tag giveaway. Admission to all Indiana Women’s Soccer home games is free of charge.