The562’s coverage of Long Beach State athletics for the 2022-23 season is sponsored by Marilyn Bohl.
The562’s coverage of Long Beach soccer for the 2022-23 season is sponsored by Beach Futbol Club.
It was all right there for Long Beach State women’s soccer to grab, and that’s what made Thursday night’s regular season finale so disappointing.
The Beach created more than enough chances to score a goal for a win on Senior Night that would’ve given them a share of the Big West title and the opportunity to host the conference tournament next week.
Instead, visiting UC Davis scored a 84th minute goal against the run of play to upset LBSU 1-0.
Now the Beach (6-5-6, 5-1-3) enters the conference tournament as the four-seed and has to host UC Santa Barbara on Sunday for a chance to travel to the semifinals on Thursday. The conference tournament championship game is next Sunday at Cal Poly.
“We had a home game to win, and we’ve just got to put the ball in the net,” LBSU coach Mauricio Ingrassia said. “I thought we played well. We have to be more clinical with our finishing. We had it in front of their net and made their goalie look good. We had good looks. That’s a maturity thing sometimes.”
LBSU outshot UC Davis 19-7 for the game and held a 14-1 advantage on corner kicks. The Beach had 63 percent of the possession in the game, and 71 percent of that possession was in the UC Davis end.
“We had it on the last day, but credit to Davis because they played hard, stayed organized and their keeper was where she needed to be,” Ingrassia added.
UC Davis (8-5-4, 5-2-2) got nine saves from goalkeeper Caeley Goldstein.
Both teams took awhile to gain any footing and LBSU earned its first shot on goal in the 20th minute when Lena Silano played a perfect through ball for Cherrie Cox in the box, but Goldstein met her shot at the post for a save.
UC Davis didn’t earn its first shot until the 28th minute, just before another quality chance created by Silano and Cox was thwarted by Goldstein.
Cox had a golden opportunity to give the Beach a lead just seconds into the second half, but her shot went directly at Goldstein. The Beach went on to take 13 shots in the second half alone.
Summer Laskey came off the bench and had a pair of shots on goal before a deflected ball in the 84th minute opened up a counter attack for UC Davis. Sarah Canavan scored the turnover to give the Aggies the upset.
“We have to recover well because we’ve got a game on Sunday right here against Santa Barbara,” Ingrassia said. “We’ve got to turn the page quickly and have a short term memory.”
LBSU lost 2-1 at UCSB last weekend in their regular season meeting.
Information on game time and ticket purchases will be announced on Friday.
