Women's Soccer | 8/29/2018 9:35:00 PM
MONTREAL --
Victoria Sturgess from Quakertown, Penn., scored back-to-back goals as the McGill University women's soccer team skunked Sherbrooke 4-0 in the RSEQ regular season opener before 323 fans on a muggy night at Percival Molson Stadium, Wednesday.
The Martlets, who swept both confrontations against Sherbrooke last year, improved their head-to-head record to 5-10-2 against the Vert & Or since 2011.
Fifth-year goalkeeper
Sarah Dubois, a 5-foot-8 native of Edmonton, made four saves for the shutout as McGill tallied twice in the first five minutes, then led 3-0 at halftime and added a late marker to round out the scoring. The Martlets had an 11-4 margin in shots on goal and a 5-0 edge in corner-kicks.
Claudia Agozzino, a fifth-year civil engineering senior from Montreal, opened the blitzkrieg with what proved to be the winning goal in just the fourth minute of play.
"Claudia, who struck from afar, was very confident in her shot, saw the open space space and buried it, said
Jose-Luis Valdes, in his fifth season as head coach at McGill.
Sturgess, a 19-year-old bioengineering sophomore, added another less than a minute later. She converted a rebound off the crossbar from teammate
Tia Lore. Sturgess then connected again in the 44th minute. She converted a breakway that had initiated from a counter-attack in McGill's defensive zone, which went to midfielder
Ruxandra Zamfir, who put a through-ball into the offensive zone.
"It was really an efficient play that involved our defenders, midfielders and forwards, said Valdes. "Very nice to see that type of play this early in the season. We had been working on that in the preseason and it paid off today. Also, we've been encouraging our players to shoot more and they took quite a few shots today if you look at the stats (20 attempted shots). We're happy that we were able to apply that (philosophy) right away in our first game. That forces opposing defenders to challenge us on every single play instead of sitting back and evaluating how we are about to attack. It's interesting and creates scoring opportunities."
Montrealer
Giovanna Tiberio, a 5-foot-10 sophomore forward from Montreal, rounded out the scoring with a header in the 93rd minute.
McGill, which posted a 5-5-4 third-place in the eight-team RSEQ conference last year, does not have much time to bask in the glow of their season-opening victory. The Martlets (1-0-0) will have a day before turning their focus on the Montreal Carabins (0-0-1), who opened their season with a 0-0 home-field draw against Laval (0-0-1), the defending RSEQ champions.
U de M will visit Molson Stadium on Friday at 6 p.m. The Carabins finished second in the league last year with a 10-0-4 record.
Sherbrooke (0-1-0) will host UQAM on Friday.
GAME STATISTICS
| McGill |
Game Total |
Sherbrooke |
| 4 |
Goals |
0 |
| 11 |
Shots On Goal |
4 |
| 9 |
Missed Shot Attempts |
6 |
| 55 |
% Shot Attempts On Goal |
40 |
| 20 |
% Shot Attempts Scored |
0 |
| 54:10 |
Time of Possession |
35:50 |
| 60% |
Time of Possession % |
40% |
| 538 |
First Touches |
401 |
| 12.9 |
Average Time of a Possession (sec) |
8.5 |
| 356 |
Passes |
220 |
| 66% |
Pass Completion % |
55% |
| 61 |
Number of Pass Strings |
31 |
| 4.8 |
Average Pass String Length |
4.4 |
| 12 |
Longest Pass String |
9 |
| 5 |
Corner Kicks |
0 |
| 3 |
Fouls Committed |
5 |
| 4 |
Goalkeeper Saves |
7 |
| 100 |
Goalkeeper Save % |
64 |
TIME OF GAME: na
ATTENDANCE: 312
Scoring Summary
Cards
| McGill |
Sherbrooke |
| None |
None |
Goalkeepers
| McGill |
Sherbrooke |
| Sarah Dubois (W, 90:00, 0GA, 4 SVS, SHO) |
Camille Melancon (L; 90:00, 4GA, 7 SVS) |
| 2018 RSEQ Women's Soccer Standings • Classement de la saison régulière du RSEQ 2018-2019 |
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