UC Riverside Women's Soccer Season Ends With Loss At UC Irvine

Sunday, October 30

Irvine, CA

2:00 PM

UC Riverside

UC Irvine

Photo by: Gabriel L. Acosta

UC Riverside Women's Soccer Season Ends With Loss At UC Irvine

10/30/2011 5:06:00 PM | Women's Soccer

Irvine, CA—The UC Riverside Women's Soccer team entered Sunday's match at UC Irvine knowing that a win over the top seeded Anteaters would put them in the Big West Conference Tournament for the first time since 2005. Unfortunately, it was not to be as UC Irvine pitched a 5-0 shutout on the day, ending the Highlanders season (Box score).

UCR hung tough for the first third of the match as the team's were knotted in a scoreless tie until the 39th minute of play. That's when Natalia Ledesma scored her first goal of the season, sending the Anteaters into halftime with a 1-0 lead.

The Highlanders pushed forward in the second period knowing that a loss, or even a tie, would mean the end of their season. UC Irvine took advantage of that aggression, however, scoring four goals in the final 45 minutes.

Lexi Kopf scored three of those goals for her ninth, 10th and 11th scores of the season as the 'Eaters locked up the number one seed with a 6-1-1 record in conference.

The Highlanders fell to 3-4-1 and finished the year tied with Cal State Fullerton for fifth place. That is UCR's best Big West mark since the 2005 campaign, and the team's 8-9-1 overall record was its best since 2006.