ASU Soccer: Sun Devils unable to execute on offense, fall to WSU 1-0

(Photo: Nicholas Badders/WCSN)

The Arizona Sun Devils lost 1-0 to Washington State Thursday night to keep them winless since September 22.

ASU head coach Graham Winkworth talked about the team’s defensive game plan for tonight’s match after the game, saying, “(Washington State) are so fast and athletic on top that we couldn’t allow them the spacing behind (our defenders). We knew that with them shooting from distance with Nikki on the goal we would be fine.”

The defensive strategy the Devils had seemed to work for most of the match. The backline played extremely deep, which allowed the Cougars to get forward, but the defense held strong and forced them to take long shots that goalkeeper Nikki Panas had little trouble with.

Washington State however, was finally able break the defensive line in the 62nd minute as midfielder Sydney Pulver beat ASU’s Taylor Coon in the right flank to cross the ball into the middle of the box, where poorly marked forward freshman Elyse Bennett was able to head the ball in for her second goal of the season.

After that, ASU tried a few things on offense to even the score but their defensive strategy is what really hurt them when it came to scoring.

Arizona State’s offensive strategy was simple: park the bus on defense and when gaining possession, look for the quick counter attack.

Playing as deep as the Sun Devils did, however, allowed the Cougars to easily keep possession in ASU’s defensive third for most of the game. Whenever WSU did lose possession, they pressured and charged the ball to force bad touches and passes from Sun Devil defenders to gain the ball back quickly. Because of this, ASU only had 3 shots on goal for the whole game.

The first opportunity was probably the best one for ASU, an opportunity that came in the 58th minute.

A good ball into the box from Christina Edwards was headed by forward Jazmarie Mader in the far post and the shot was barely saved by Washington State goalkeeper, Ella Dederick.

There were more occurrences for Washington State when they seemed to have a good chance to score.

A memorable one occured when a Washington State forward deflected a pass attempt by ASU defender Angela Boyle and the Cougar forward seemed to be charging all alone towards goal, but Angela Boyle was able to track her down and make an impressive tackle to not cost the Sun Devils another goal.

For ASU, the game was a lot similar to the one against Oregon in terms of the team’s game plan and the lack of execution all game long.

The Sun Devils will look to bounce back in their final home game of the season against Washington, on senior day this Sunday afternoon at 1 pm.