A&M Falls to South Carolina on 89th Minute Goal

Thursday, September 24

Columbia, S.C.

6:00 PM

Texas A&M

9-2-0 (2-1-0)

South Carolina

9-1-0 (3-0-0)

Texas A&M

South Carolina

Photo by: Texas A&M Athletics

Sep 24, 2015 | Soccer

Box Score

COLUMBIA, South Carolina – The No. 4 Texas A&M Aggies dropped a 2-1 decision to the No. 17 South Carolina Gamecocks at Stone Stadium on Thursday evening.

With the loss, Texas A&M fell to 9-2-0 and dropped out of a first-place tie with the Gamecocks and Kentucky at 2-1-0 in SEC play. South Carolina improved to 9-1-0 overall and 3-0-0 in league action.

Raina Johnson scored the game-winning goal with 1:48 remaining in the second half. Stevi Parker chipped a ball into the penalty box that appeared to be going over the end line to the right of the goal. Sophie Groff raced to save the ball from going out of bounds, beating A&M goalkeeper Taylor Saucier, and served a pass across the face of the goal where Johnson was able to get a head on it from five yards out for her second goal of the season.

Texas A&M missed an opportunity to take the lead with 6:30 remaining in the second half. Karlie Mueller served a free kick into the penalty box from 40 yards out. Her service found the head of McKayla Paulson 15 yards out. Paulson's looping header went over the South Carolina goalkeeper Abby Crider and hit the cross bar. The carom came back out to the top of the six-yard box, where Amethyst Kelly was able to knock a header to Haley Pounds unmarked off to her right. Pounds sent a header to an open right side of the goal, but Crider made a lunging stop to save the ball inches from the goalline.

Trailing 1-0 for 64 minutes, the Gamecocks scored the equalizer in the 74th minute. Daija Griffin uncorked a shot from the top of the penalty arc, beating Saucier to the left to not the game at 1-1 with 16:42 remaining in regulation.

For the match, South Carolina owned the edge in shots (15-8), shots-on-goal (10-4) and corner kicks (9-3).

The Aggies broke the scoring seal in the 10th minute with Ally Watt's first career goal. Working to the right of the penalty arc, Mikaela Harvey dumped a pass off to Watt at the left elbow of the penalty box. Watt took one dribble and unleashed a low driving ball with her right foot that hit off the mitts of goalkeeper Abby Crider and skipped into the goal.

In the first half, both teams alternated offensive aggression with South Carolina owning the advantages in shots (5-4), shots-on-goal (4-2) and corner kicks (5-2) at the intermission.

Taylor Saucier kept the Gamecocks off the scoreboard in the first half with four saves, including a spectacular stop on a ripper from Parker from 20 yards out in the 22nd minute.

For the contest, Saucier made seven saves and the Aggie backline had a team save. Crider made three saves for the Gamecocks.

The Aggies return to action on Sunday as they travel to Athens for a 12 pm match against the Georgia Bulldogs. The contest will air on ESPNU.

TEXAS A&M QUOTES

Head Coach G Guerrieri

On the match: We weren't very good tonight. I was pleased with the way we battled, but our quality of play was not what we were looking for as far as keeping possession and connecting passes. South Carolina was very, very good and you have to give them a lot of credit for the way they played and the heart they showed to get the win at the end.

On moving forward to Sunday: The good thing is we have two days to bounce back. We're going to put the pieces back together, put together a good plan for Georgia and look for the players to execute and put quality effort in on Sunday.