Defense may win championships, but it apparently doesn’t win season openers.
The Long Beach State women’s soccer team relied heavily upon a stout defense throughout its season-opening game against Northern Arizona, but it couldn’t provide offensive support in a 1-0 loss.
The 49er backfield of Marie MacKenzie, Taylor Nelson, Mimi Akaogi and Melanie Fox kept the Lumberjack forwards from mounting an attack for most of the match’s 90 minutes, allowing only four shots for the entirety of the game.
An intercepted pass in the 46th minute of Friday night’s game was just about the only mistake made by the LBSU defense, which featured none of the starting defenders from last year’s team. The only returning starters that played in the back line were Nelson and MacKenzie, and they were both midfielders previously.
Despite having a reconstructed defense, it’s clear that keeping the ball out of the goal will be a strong point for The Beach this season.
“Our defense and midfield were very strong,” sophomore forward Elizabeth Lyons said. “It’s just that final pass we need to work on.”
Had the 49ers scored on even a tenth of their opportunities, they would have left George Allen Field with a win. The Lumberjacks had one good opportunity, and it was all they needed. They didn’t have any corner kicks or well-positioned free kicks, but they did take advantage of the one scoring chance that they got.
Just more than a minute after the start of the second half, a botched pass in the 49er backfield allowed the NAU forwards to create a one-on-one matchup with LBSU goalkeeper Ashton McKeown. It was McKeown’s only chance of the game to make a save, and it wouldn’t have been easy: she was left guessing, and the goal was scored from penalty-kick range.
The single slip-up ultimately determined the outcome of the game for the 49ers, but as a whole, it was a promising performance for a unit that could have been a major liability for the team this year.
NAU wasn’t the strongest of opponents (it went 5-9-5 as a member of the Big Sky Conference in 2012), so The Beach will certainly get a better idea of where it stands when it visits West Coast Conference power Santa Clara this weekend. But with a new team in a new season, a strong performance by a rebuilt defense is a good sign for the future.