Soccer: Aggies bring the heat to Arizona 7-2 and advance to Sweet 16

Revenge is a dish best served cold, at least that’s how the saying goes.

After a 2-2 draw with Arizona earlier in the season, the Aggies came out hot tonight.

This game had impressive performances across the board from this A&M team, including one from Jordan Day.

With the score still knotted up at 0-0, Jordan came out and took on an Arizona break away one on one, and stuffed her. Tony Amato, Arizona’s head coach, summed it up well, “Early on, getting a goal like that can change momentum, but honestly in this one, I don’t think it would have mattered.

With all the momentum on their side, the Aggies pounced on the Wildcats with three goals in five minutes of game time.

The scoring barrage started with free kick off the foot of Meghan Streight from midfield that was deflected by Bianca Brinson right to Annie Kunz, who drove it home for a 1-0 lead in the 14th minute. Two goals from Kelley Monogue, both before the 20th minute, put the Aggies well out in front. The first of the two was thrown in from Karlie Mueller and bounced past multiple defenders before Kelley flicked it past the keeper.

It was at this point in the game that Arizona Head Coach Tony Amato stated, “If you could call timeouts in soccer, I would have used on. They just seized the momentum.”

Before the half, Allie Bailey collected two goals of her own. Both were powerful shots from the left corner of the box, one off of a deflection and the second zipped past the keeper into the corner. 5-0.

Coming into the second half, it would be easy and even understandable to lay off and rest for Sunday. The Aggies and Coach Guerrieri knew this was not the type of team to sit back on, “This Arizona team has an understanding of the moment they are in and knowing that the game is only 45 minutes done. We needed to come out and make a statement; Shea’s goal in the 47th minute did that.”

Shea’s goal to start the second half was stripped from a defender and rocketed in from 15 yards out. Her next attempt was off the bar, out of the keepers hands and put back by Bianca Brinson for the Aggies 7th goal of the contest.

Arizona scored on two set pieces in the second half to get on the board, and while they made little difference, Coach Guerrieri knows it is something to improve on, “Arizona scored the way we thought they would. We haven’t given up a goal off of a restart in a long time and that is a testament to how good Arizona is at what they do. We’ll work on cleaning that up.”

Coach Guerrieri had a good sense of the difference between this victory and the first meeting with the Wildcats, “We scored our chances. Everything we hit in Arizona didn’t go in.”

They certainly did this go around.

This win marks the third straight trip and 13th time overall the Aggies have advanced to the Sweet 16. It also tied a school record for wins at 21.

The Aggies next match will be Sunday against Notre Dame with a start time of  1:30 PM.