SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A run of three straight matches at home ends with its second consecutive Big West Conference opponent as the Sacramento State women's soccer team hosts Cal Poly on Thursday (Aug. 29) at 1 p.m. It is the lone match of the week for the Hornets, who don't return to the field until a trip to Oregon to take on Portland and the University of Oregon following the Labor Day holiday.
THIS WEEK…
MATCH #4
WHAT: Cal Poly (0-2-1, 0-0 Big West) at Sacramento State (1-1-1, 0-0 Big Sky)
WHEN: Thursday, Aug. 29, 2024
TIME: 1 p.m.
WHERE: Sacramento, Calif.
STADIUM: Hornet Soccer Field
WATCH: ESPN+
LIVE STATS: HornetStats.com
TICKETS: HornetSports.com
GAME NOTES
Sacramento State | Cal Poly
WE'LL DO IT LIVE!
• Every home match during the 2024 regular season will be streamed live on the ESPN+ subscription platform, with select road contests available on various streaming platforms.
• Links to watch and for live stats for all matches will be posted, as soon as they are available, on the women's soccer schedule page at HornetSports.com
O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAINS!
• Seniors Abigail Lopez and Isabella Vinsonhaler, along with junior Madelyn Dougherty and sophomore Ellie Farber, have been selected as captains for the 2024 season
• This is the third straight season that Vinsonhaler has been named a team captain, while Lopez and Dougherty were captains in 2023
SCOUTING CAL POLY
• The Mustangs enter the week with an 0-2-1 overall record, posting a 1-1 draw with Portland to start the year before falling to Fresno State and No. 6 UCLA by identical 1-0 scores
• Thursday marks Cal Poly's first road match of the season following three straight home contests to start the year
• The Mustangs have out-shot opponents by a 31-29 count on the year, but has put only 10 of those 31 attempts on frame
• Senior forward Emily Nedom has the team's lone goal on the year, scoring in the 34th minute against the Pilots to stake Cal Poly to an early lead off an assist by Kiki Vostermans
• Senior goalkeeper Mackenzie Samuel has started two of the three matches in net, posting a 1.00 goals against average and making seven saves against 21 shots faced
• Defender Emma Brown is the reigning Big West Defensive Player of the Year and was one of 26 players tabbed as a "Defender to Watch" by United Soccer Coaches for 2024
• Head Coach Alex Crozier is in his 33rd season at the helm of the Mustang program -- the only head coach in the history of the women's soccer program
• Overall, Cal Poly returns 26 letter winners, 10 starters, and 90 percent of its goal production from last season, bringing back its top seven point-getters from a year ago
SERIES NOTABLES
• Cal Poly leads the all-time series with Sacramento State by an 8-2 count
• The Mustangs have won the last two meetings, posting a 4-2 victory in San Luis Obispo in 2021 and a 1-0 triumph in Sacramento in 2022
• Only three of 10 meetings have been decided by a single goal, while one team has scored three-or-more goals five times
• Both of the Hornets' victories in the series have come at home, posting a 2-1 double-overtime victory in 2006 and a 3-1 win in 2019 -- the latter marking Sacramento State's last win in the series
CONFERENCE CALL
• Sacramento State is 26-53-13 against Big West Conference schools since 1994
• The Hornets have faced 10 of the league's 11 current members, having met all but UC San Diego in that span
• Including this year's meeting, the 25 matches against UC Davis are the most for the Hornets against any Big West school
• Sacramento State's eight wins over Cal State Bakersfield are the most against any Big West opponent
• The Hornets were 1-3-1 against the Big West in 2023, posting a win over UC Riverside and a draw with the Roadrunners
• Sacramento State is just 1-5-4 in its last 10 against Big West opponents since 2022
• Thursday's match against Cal Poly is the third of five meetings against Big West opponents this season with contests against CSUN, and Cal State Bakersfield remaining
LOOKING BACK
Sacramento State 1, UC Santa Barbara 1
• The Hornets had a flair for the dramatic in their only match of the week, scoring with less than two minutes remaining in regulation to forge a draw with the Gauchos
• Sophomore Ellie Farber scored for the second straight match, chipping home the game-tying score off assists from Ariana Scholten and Alejandra Melendez
• Scholten's assist was the second of her Sacramento State career, while Melendez posted her first point as a Hornet
OFF TO A FLYING START
• Thanks to results in each of their last two contests, the Hornets are off to their best start in a non-pandemic season since the 2019 squad also opened with a 1-1-1 record
• Sacramento State did open the pandemic-delayed 2020-21 spring season with a 1-0-4 overall mark
BACK-TO-BACK
• With goals in each of her last two matches, Farber became the first Hornet to score in back-to-back contests since Abigail Lopez did so against Northern Arizona (Sept. 22) and Northern Colorado (Sept. 24) last season
• A goal on Thursday against Cal Poly would make Farber the first Hornet to score a goal in three consecutive matches since Kylee Kim-Bustillos did so against California Baptist (9/8), San Jose State (9/12), and Toledo (9/15) in 2019
• As a team, the goal against UC Santa Barbara marked the first time that the Hornets have scored in back-to-back matches since defeating Northern Arizona (1-0) and Northern Colorado (2-2) on Sept. 22 and 24 last year
HELP ME, HELP YOU
• Sacramento State has four assists on its four goals through three matches to start the season, already halfway to last year's total of eight helpers on 12 scores
NOT BY A LONG SHOT
• Farber's 10 shot attempts thus far this year has her tied for second in the Big Sky Conference entering the week, while her 3.33 shots per match lead the league
• Senior Abigail Lopez is tied for sixth in the conference with eight shot attempts and ranks third in the league with 2.67 attempts per contest
AWWW... SHOOT!
• Despite being narrowly outshot by a 46-38 count through three matches this season, the Hornets' defense has done well to keep a number of those attempts away from the net, allowing only 14 shots on goal
• Sacramento State allowed only four shots out of the 17 by UC Santa Barbara to reach the net last week, including a season-high five blocked attempts by defenders
• The four shots on goal followed up an even stingier performance against Houston Christian on Aug. 17 when the Huskies were limited to two shots on goal
FARBER MAKES HER POINT(S)
• Sophomore Ellie Farber not only got the scoring started for the Hornets' in 2024 with her first-half goal against Houston Christian, but jump-started a career day for the Redding, Calif., native
• Farber's first career goal was part of a career-best three-point day -- one of three Big Sky Conference players to net a goal and an assist in the same match during the season's opening weekend and one of four overall in the league with multiple points
• Her assist on teammate Teysha-Ray Spinney-Kuahuia's second-half goal was her third career helper and her first since she had two assists at Northern Colorado in September of last season
• Farber became the first Hornet with a three-point match since Ariana Nino had a goal and an assist at Idaho in the closing minutes of a 2-1 victory on Oct. 16, 2022
• Entering the week, Farber's five points have her second in the Big Sky entering this week's matches and leading the league with 1.67 points per match
NOSE FOR THE GOAL
• Senior Abigail Lopez enters her final collegiate campaign knocking on the door of a few all-time lists in Hornet women's soccer history
• The three-time All-Big Sky Conference honoree enters this week's match with 11 career goals and five assists for 27 points
• She needs two more goals this season to break into the career top 10 in that category, while nine more points gets Lopez onto that list
• Her 94 shots are also 18 back of 10th on the career chart
• After tying her personal single-season career high with four goals in 2023, Lopez has led the team in points twice in the last three seasons (10 in 2021 and eight in 2023)
POLL POSITION
• Mirroring its finish from the 2023 season, Sacramento State was picked to finish fifth in the Big Sky Conference standings in 2024 according to a vote of the league's head coaches released on Aug. 12
• The Hornets received 36 points overall in a tightly bunched middle of the pack, trailing Portland State by a point for fourth and leading Weber State by five points in sixth
• Reigning regular season champion Montana received five of the eight first-place votes and 56 points overall, followed by Northern Arizona (one first-place vote) with 51 points in second, and tournament champion and NCAA qualifier Idaho (two first-place votes) with 47 points in third
• Idaho State (23 points) in seventh, Eastern Washington (22 points) in eighth, and Northern Colorado (one first-place vote) with 21 points finished ninth
EXHIBITIONISTS
• Sacramento State opened the season with a pair of home exhibitions, falling to No. 22 Santa Clara on Aug. 7 before bouncing back to battle Fresno State to a draw
• Senior Cassandra Herrman netted a goal late in the match against the Bulldogs to give the Hornets an early lead, looping home a free kick from distance over the Fresno State keeper
• Senior Abigail Lopez accounted for seven shots in the two contests, including a team-high four against the Bulldogs
• Sophomore goalkeeper Izzy Palmatier finished with 13 saves in the two matches -- eight of those in the battle with the ranked Broncos
ALLOW ME TO REINTRODUCE MYSELF
• Fans of the Hornets will recognize most of the 2024 roster as Sacramento State returns 17 players, 10 starters, and six redshirts off of last season's squad
• Also among the 30-woman roster for this season are seven new faces, made up of three transfers and four true freshmen
• Overall, the Hornets lost only one starter (Sammy Wong) and four letter winners off of last season's roster
STATE OF THE HORNETS
• When Sacramento State takes the field in 2024, those in the green and gold will represent five different states and the nation of Wales
• Of those 31 student-athletes, 19 of those hail from California, eight from Hawai'i (Ali Fuamatu-Ma'afala, Teysha-Ray Spinney-Kuahuia, Shaunee Egloria, Jaety Mandaquit, Candace Ching, Dalen Lau, Madelyn Dougherty, and Payton Inabata), with one each from Colorado (Ella Wilcox), Idaho (Isabella Vinsonhaler), Washington (Sierra Sonko), and the nation of South Wales (Zara Mujica)
• Sonko is the first Hornet from the "Evergreen State" since Caitlin Prothe wrapped up her stellar career in 2018
• Wilcox is the first Colorado native since Courtney Gorham finished her four years in 2005
OHANA MEANS FAMILY
• The eight Hawai'ians on this year's roster are two more than the Hornets had on their 2023 roster and are one shy of the number of "Aloha State" natives that University of Hawai'i has on its roster for 2024
A WALE(S) OF A NEWCOMER
• When she makes her first appearance between the pipes for the Hornets, goalkeeper Zara Mujica is the first player to suit up for the Hornets to hail from outside the United States since another keeper, Tiffany Genovese (Surrey, British Columbia), appeared in 11 matches as a freshman on the 2000 squad
• According to available records, those are the only two international players that Sacramento State has rostered in the history of the program
HALL OF FAMER
• Sacramento State Head Coach Randy Dedini added to his list of career accomplishments this past summer when he was inducted into the Pittsburgh Riverhounds Hall of Fame as part of the club's third class in July
• Dedini was a member of the inaugural Riverhounds team in 1999, playing five years in Pittsburgh
• He still holds club records for wins (57), shutouts (29), and matches played (125) while also holding the single-season mark with 136 saves in 1999, helping the club to its first playoff berth and victory that year
• He is also a member of Sonoma State's Hall of Fame, inducted in 2008 following an All-American playing career for the Seawolves
