JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn – Attempting to rebound from their first South Atlantic Conference loss of the season, the No. 14 Carson-Newman women's soccer team hosts the Anderson (S.C.) Trojans for a 5:00pm match at McCown Field on Saturday.
The Eagles were beaten by Lenoir-Rhyne on Wednesday, 1-0, the first time they'd been shutout in nearly two years. This loss came after five straight wins for C-N that included victories over conference opponents Newberry, Mars Hill and Queens (N.C.). Overall, the team is 7-2 with a 3-1 SAC record. Their nine points tie them with Anderson for third in the SAC behind Catawba, who's 4-0 in the conference and second-place Tusculum.
Despite being shutout, the Eagles are still leading the league in most offensive categories and are at or near the top nationally in several statistics. Their 42 goals are still the most in the country and lead the SAC by a wide margin and their 35 assists also top Division II. Julianne Herrity (Donegal, Ireland), the reigning SAC Player of the Week, leads the conference with 13 goals, a total that's also second nationally. Not far behind is teammate Lauren Wade (Coleraine, Northern Ireland), who has the second-most goals in the league with 11, which ties her for Division II's third most. In the assist category, C-N has four players in the top five, including Wade and Holly Talbut-Smith (Crawley, England), who are tied for the most in the SAC with six. Wade and Herrity are also tied atop the leaderboard with 28 points.
The defense has been led by senior fullback Elissa Lane (Knoxville, Tenn.) and goalkeeper Jacqueline Burns (Cookstown, Northern Ireland), two of only six C-N players who have started all nine games this season. Lane, along with Lara Hallgrimsdottir (Kopavogur, Iceland), Averi Williams (Powell, Tenn.) and Helen Seed (Preston, England), make up a back line that has allowed the fewest shots on goal in the SAC. Burns' goals-against-average of 0.67 leads the conference, as do her five shutouts. Over the last five games, the Eagles have allowed only two goals and they've allowed one or zero goals in eight of their nine games in 2016.
The Anderson Trojans have hit the halfway point in their season and are currently 6-2. They also enter this match off a loss, as they fell to Tusculum on Saturday 1-0 at home. That defeat snapped a three-game win streak for the Trojans, but they still reside in the top half of the table with nine points, the same total as Carson-Newman. Anderson is currently 3-1 in conference, as they defeated Coker, Wingate and Brevard before losing to Tusculum.
Saturday's loss also broke a streak of three consecutive shutouts for the Trojans, a string that brought their total to a conference-best six clean sheets on the year. Anderson's five goals allowed and 0.62 GAA are also the best in the SAC and in the top 30 in Division II. Goalkeepers Abby Helm and Bianca Porras have both spent time in net for the Trojans. Helm started the first six games on the schedule, five of which ended in shutouts for her team. Helm's save percentage of .879 is the best in the league and her four goals against and 0.68 GAA are the SAC's second best. Porras has started the last two matches and has given up only one goal, as she shutout Brevard in her first start, making three saves in a 1-0 win and also collected six saves in her team's loss to Tusculum. Through two games, she owns a better GAA and save percentage than Helm, but Helm has spent considerably more time in goal.
On offense, graduate student Tina Shakes has led a group that's scored the third most goals the SAC. Shakes has eight scores and 17 points to her credit, both of which are the conference's third most. Her season has included a four goal performance against North Greenville on September 7th, a game in which she supplied all the offense for the Trojans. Alaina Gay is second on the squad with four goals and her two assists are tied with Sophie Riggs for the most on the team.
Anderson leads the all-time series with Carson-Newman, 7-6 with one tie. The Eagles had not beaten their conference rivals in five years until last year's SAC tournament, when C-N pulled out a 1-0 win that allowed them to advance to the conference title game. Prior to that, the Trojans had won five straight matches in the series, including handing the Eagles their only conference loss of 2015, knocking them off 2-1 in Spartanburg, S.C. in a contest in which Helm made 11 saves and kept Carson-Newman off the scoreboard in the second half.
Mark Inserra will have the call of Saturday's match as cneagles.com/live will have live video and stats for all 90 minutes. At the conclusion of the game, cneagles.com is where you can go for a full recap of the action.
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