AMES — The Iowa State soccer team’s offense finally found success in its 1-0 win against Kansas Thursday to move to 5-10-1 on the season.
The first 15 minutes of the game were all Kansas. The Jayhawks came out with a lot of pressure and energy. They managed to take a 8-0 shot advantage, 4-0 shot-on-goal advantage and 4-0 corner-kick advantage early into the game.
The Cyclones showed poise but struggled to get momentum rolling through the entirety of the half. They found themselves having to defend more, which limited their scoring chances.
Although the first half was scoreless, the Jayhawks outplayed the Cyclones in every category possible. Kansas outshot Iowa State 14-5 across the first 45 minutes of action. Kansas tallied eight corners to Iowa State’s one and forced Avery Gillahan to be on the ball constantly, as the redshirt freshman recorded seven saves in the first half.
Iowa State opened up the second half with energy and kept applying pressure to the Kansas backline for the next 15 minutes. The Cyclones made clear halftime adjustments as they were more aggressive on the ball.
Any adjustments they made paid off in the 55th minute when Sophia Thomas scored her first goal of the season off a right-footed shot into the back of the net that passed the diving Jayhawk goalkeeper. Abigail Miller got her first assist of the year as well.
From then on, the game was a defensive battle with no real chances coming on either side. The Iowa State back-line took care of business and forced most shots that Kansas took off target.
When looking at the final stat-line, many would assume Iowa State lost, however the Cyclones took their chances wisely and ended up getting a much-needed win to stay alive for any shot at the Big 12 Tournament.
Kansas outshot the Cyclones 22-12, out-cornered 10-4 and had six less fouls than Iowa State. However, of those 22 shots that Kansas took, only nine had any threat of going in the back of the net. The Cyclones however had a near 50% shot-on-goal percentage and got one to go in.
Gillahan tied a career-high with eight saves and received her third career shutout of the season.
“We knew coming in it was going to be a really good, really enjoyable game of football,” Iowa State head coach Matt Fannon said. “We knew that someone, and ultimately was us, was going to come out and win the game. We knew it was going to be a bit of a tactical chess game and we knew that at some point one of our players was going to step up and say, ‘Our team wants it more,’ and they did and I’m proud of them.”
Fannon spoke on the battle between the bottom two seeds of the conference. Going into the game Fannon claimed that it was a “do or die” matchup and his team ultimately pulled through and kept their hopes alive for any potential postseason play.
The Cyclones will have a short break and travel to Manhattan, Kansas, to take on the Wildcats at 1 p.m. Sunday.
The game will be broadcast on Big 12 now on ESPN+ following a change in game time.
