On Thursday, No. 2 Stanford women’s soccer defeated San Diego State 3-0 in a night match at Cagan Stadium. Charlotte Kohler (12:04), Andrea Kitahata (13:19), and Allie Montoya (18:00) scored for the Cardinal, all within the first 20 minutes of the match. Caroline Birkel once again got the start in the net for the Cardinal, playing the first half of the match. Stanford improves to 3-0 overall while San Diego State falls to 1-2.
BOX SCORE: Stanford vs. San Diego State-Thursday, August 21st
“Yeah, we started fast, scored three great goals,” Stanford head coach Paul Ratcliffe said after the match. “I think all of them are goal of the year candidates already. Fantastic goals. Good pressure. And yeah, pleased with the performance. Got a lot of players to play tonight and good three goal win.”
This match really was one-way traffic from the jump as Stanford quickly pounced on the Aztecs with three goals in the first 20 minutes. First 18 minutes to be exact. Stanford had two early corner kicks at 10:30 and 11:09, establishing momentum early. At 12:04, Stanford scored their first goal as Charlotte Kohler found the top right of the goal off her right foot thanks to an assist from Allie Montoya. That made it 1-0.
“I mean, I think we had a really good team press that we’ve been working on and that helped us this game to win the ball up high on the field,” Kohler said. “So, Allie won it off that and played a really nice first-time ball to the top of the box and there wasn’t a lot of pressure on me, so I just hit it. And it went in!”
“Well, Charlotte was amazing as a freshman and she’s amazing as a sophomore,” Ratcliffe said of Kohler. “So, she’s just a great talent and the goal, the quality of the goal she scored was the highest-level tonight. But yeah, Charlotte’s amazing. She continues to grow and develop and get better, but she’s been good from day one in fairness to her. She puts in a lot of work and deserves the opportunity she’s getting.”
Less than 90 seconds later, Andrea Kitahata found the top right of the goal off her right foot to make it 2-0 at the 13:19 mark. San Diego State was now in an early hole as Stanford had all the momentum. As if that wasn’t enough to bury the Aztecs, the Cardinal added a third goal in less than five minutes after the second goal as Montoya found the bottom left of the goal off her right foot. Right at the 18:00 mark. That made it a 3-0 lead for the Cardinal.
“I think just mentality of the group,” Ratcliffe said of the key to scoring so fast. “They’re working really hard and we got after them. There’s a lot of pressure on the ball. They’re excited to play, love playing at Cagan, and just capitalized with some, but they were really good goals.”
Oddly enough, Stanford did not score the rest of the match despite having corner kicks at 21:45, 22:54, 56:28, 56:49, 80:59, 82:37, 84:49, and 85:19. Oh, and they had a corner kick at 89:47. I almost forgot. Stanford had plenty of chances to tack on a fourth or even fifth goal, but it wasn’t to be. Some of that was due to San Diego State making some adjustment and some of that was just a function of soccer being soccer.
Ideally, Stanford would have added at least one more goal given they outshot San Diego State 30-4, but on the whole, they can’t complain with a 3-0 victory under the lights. They came out with great energy, pounced on the Aztecs early, and then didn’t give up any goals for the entire match. At the end of the day, the objective is to win the match and on the whole, the Cardinal did so convincingly.
“Yeah, I think we always prioritize coming out strong,” Kohler affirmed. “We want to dominate the first five minutes of the game and we have a goal to get a shot in the first five. Things like that. So, I think that really helps us to come out strong, put the other team on their heels, and once we get those first three, they usually come easier after that.”
Up next for Stanford is a home match against Saint Mary’s on Sunday, August 24th at 1:00 PM PT on ACCNX. The Cardinal will look to improve to 4-0 on the season against a Bay Area foe.
“Yeah, hopefully it will be a little bit cooler, I felt for the men today,” Ratcliffe said looking ahead to Sunday. “It was a warm day. I mean, cooled down a little bit this evening, so it was nice. I think it’ll be a good test. Another local team that knows us well. Saint Mary’s does a good job, Theresa Wagner [Romagnolo] is a good friend of mine. She’s one of my former assistants that is an exceptional coach. So I know they’re going to come in and do a really good job and be well-organized for us and Saint Mary’s has a really good team. So I think it’s going to be a good test.”
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