CLEMSON, South Carolina – After Danielle Rice came up with a penalty kick save on a shot by Ole Miss’s Gretchen Harknett in the sixth round of the shootout, Sarah Shaw found the back of the net with her missile to send the No. 21 Texas A&M Aggies to their sixth NCAA Elite Eight, including their second consecutive appearance. The match went to a penalty kick shootout after the teams played to a 1-1 draw through 110 minutes at Riggs Field.
Ole Miss (14-5-4) jumped to an early edge in the shootout as Jessica Hiskey made her shot and Karlie Mueller‘s offering hit a post. The second round found the Rebels’ Jennifer Miller and A&M’sKristi Leonard making shots. Things evened out in the third round as Rice made a stop on Bethany Bunker’s shot and Ally Watt hit net a laser.
The shootout was tied 4-4 after the mandatory five rounds with Addie Forbus and Marnie Merritt finding success for Ole Miss and Brittany Crabtree and Haley Pounds striking gold for the Aggies.
With the shootout in sudden death, Rice gave the Aggies the chance to advance as she stonewalled Harknett on a shot to the left. Shaw struck her shot with confidence and the Maroon and White stormed the field in celebration.
The Aggies continued their run of success in penalty kick shootouts, advancing for the 10th consecutive time, including seven advances in NCAA Championship play.
Texas A&M (17-6-2) had to play the last 16:28 of overtime with just 10 players as Mikaela Harvey was sent off with a red card after going down in the penalty box on goalward charge.
The Aggies did not let the one-player disadvantage slow down their attack as the outshot Ole Miss 5-0 in the overtime sessions. With 10 seconds remaining in the first overtime session, Pounds uncorked a shot from 15 yards that forced the Rebels’ keeper to make a brilliant save on.
Midway through second overtime period, Ally Watt had a shot from 12 yards out on the right that forced Merritt to making a diving save, leading to a corner kick. The corner kick offering led to a header by Margaret Schmidt that went a foot over the crossbar. With three minutes remaining, Emily Bates sent a volley from seven yards just inches over the crossbar.
The Aggies held the edge in offensive numbers, including 17-6 in shots, 7-2 in shots-on-goal and 5-2 in corner kicks. The bruising affair had Ole Miss owning a 23-16 edge in fouls.
The Rebels broke the scoring seal in the 14th minute. Jennifer Miller sent a cross into the box from the right side, finding the head of Liza Harbin who was making a charge to the far post. Harbin put the header past Aggie goalkeeper Danielle Ricefor her second goal of the season and the 1-0 lead.
Texas A&M missed opportunities to put an equalizer in midway through the first half. In the 24th minute, Mikaela Harveyweaved through the defense and set up a shot from nine yards, but a charging Ole Miss keeper, Marnie Merritt made the stop. The carom went to Haley Pounds who unleashed a shot from 20 yards, but it went a foot wide to the right. In the 27thminute, Pounds hit a sharp volley from 15 yards that Merritt had to scoop up.
The Maroon and White tied the game in the 31st minute with a golazo by Harvey. From the left flank, Kate Hajdu sent a pass to Harvey at the top of the box. After one touch to find a shooting lane, Harvey rifled a shot from 18 yards into the left upper 90 for her seventh goal of the season.
The 1-1 halftime score belied the Aggies control of the action, outshooting the Rebels 8-2 in the first half.
The Aggies return to action on Friday as they travel to Tallahassee for a 1 pm Central match at Florida State.
TEXAS A&M QUOTES
Head Coach G Guerrieri
On advancing to the Elite Eight…
It’s been a really hard fought set of matches to get to the Elite Eight. Hats off to Matthew Mott and the Rebels. They did a great job. It was a back-and-forth game. They scored on a great goal, but Mikaela (Harvey) came back with a fantastic goal of her own. We really had to fight through playing most of the overtime with only 10 players, but we had the most possession and most dangerous attacks. Really proud of these guys and next week we’ll try to get back to the College Cup.
On the shootout…
One of the things we take a lot of pride in are PKs. We feel we’re not just a good penalty kicking team, but we’re a great penalty kicking team. And if you look at our record over the years it reflects that. You can see over a long period of time, we’ve done very well at it. We put a lot of time in trying to perfect it as we near the post season and you could see how it paid off. Even after falling behind on the first round of kicks, our girl came up and took confident shots. And Dani (Rice) came up huge. She came up big and it’s not a fluke. She made the big stop in the regular-season finale, too.
Junior Sarah Shaw
On her game-winning penalty kick…
We practice PKs every day. By the end of the season, it’s literally been hours of work putting it in the back of the net. I know my teammates had my back and if I missed, we’d still outlast them. I noticed on every kick she would just run to the side, so I was close to just kick it right down the middle. But she stayed in the middle, so luckily I stayed with my plan.
Junior Danielle Rice
On the 110 minutes of play…
I was confident. I really thought we were going to come out with a win in regulation or overtime. We kept on the attack and had the ball on the offensive side for most of the second half and overtime. I was prepared for the penalty kicks. After they had to go through PKs against Clemson, we had some idea what they might do.
On the two saves…
It should’ve been four saves. We had some idea what they were going to do. But there are no words for this. This is a great feeling and this team just keeps fighting as one to take the next step.
Story courtesy of Texas A&M Athletics