Late goal dooms Lady Ospreys

Friday, September 12

Greeley, Colo.

6:30 p.m.

University of North Florida

Oregon State University

Junior Whitney Colburn played all 90 minutes and took a shot

9/13/2008 12:38:59 AM | Women's Soccer

UNF battles Rider on Sunday at noon

By: Adam Jonson, UNF Athletics

GREELEY, Colo. – Eighty-five minutes elapsed in Friday night's women's college soccer match between the University of North Florida and Oregon State before the Beavers scored the only goal of the contest to defeat the Lady Ospreys, 1-0, in the first day of the Northern Colorado tournament.

“I feel like we were two pretty evenly matched teams,” UNF head coach Linda Hamilton said. “Our defense played well all night, but we let our guard down right at the end and they capitalized on that to win the game.”

UNF (1-3-1) fired three shots on the night, two of which were on goal. Juniors Whitney Colburn, Katelin Swift and Kristin Rhodes each fired a shot. Rhodes' and Swift's shots were on goal.

OSU (4-1-0) showed no hesitation striking the ball toward the net, rattling off 20 shots, but only seven were on goal. The deciding goal came off the foot of Jessica Velazquez with 4:42 left to play. She placed the ball in the top left corner of the net after receiving a pass from Najma Homidi.

Senior goalkeeper Rachael Howard returned to defend the goal for the Lady Ospreys after a one-game break. She made six saves on Friday and allowed one goal in 90 minutes of action.

“We must recover mentally at this point,” Hamilton said. “We need to focus on the mental errors we are committing and correct them before we get back on the field.”

UNF returns to the field on Sunday, concluding its participation in the Northern Colorado tournament with a noon match against Rider.