SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The Sacramento State women's soccer team closes out the non-conference portion of its 2024 slate with a single match this week, traveling to Cedar City, Utah, to take on Southern Utah at Noon PT. The contest is the second in a run of four straight on the road for the Hornets, who open Big Sky Conference play at Idaho (Sept. 27) and at Eastern Washington (Sept. 29) next week.
MATCH #9
WHAT: Sacramento State (2-3-3) at Southern Utah (1-5-2)
WHEN: Thursday, Sept. 19, 2024
TIME: Noon PT
WHERE: Cedar City, Utah
STADIUM: Thunderbird Soccer Field
WATCH: ESPN+
LIVE STATS: SUUTBirds.com
GAME NOTES
Sacramento State | Southern Utah
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 SOUTHERN UTAH
• The Thunderbirds enter the week with a 1-5-2 overall record and are winless in their last three following losses to Denver (5-2) and Boise State (3-0) as well as a draw with Idaho State (0-0)
• Sacramento State is the third Big Sky opponent for Southern Utah this year, having drawn with Eastern Washington (1-1) on Aug. 29 along with the scoreless tie against the Bengals
• The Thunderbirds are 1-2-1 at home this year with their lone victory coming against Colorado College (2-0) on Sept. 5
• Junior forward Whitney Gardner leads Southern Utah with a pair of goals and three assists for seven points
• Junior forward Sarah Assumma and freshman midfielder Chelsea Loeser have also scored twice this year
• Senior goalkeeper Darya Mosallaei has started every match in net and played all but 18 minutes on the season, posting a 1.74 goals against average and 34 saves (.708 save percentage) to go along with two shutouts
SERIES NOTABLES
• Sacramento State leads the all-time series with Southern Utah by a 6-3 count
• The Thunderbirds, however, have won two of the last three meetings
• The two programs haven't met since 2021, a 2-0 Southern Utah win in Sacramento
• It a reunion of former Big Sky Conference rivals as the Thunderbirds were members of the league from 2012-21
• This will be the first non-conference meeting between the two programs as the nine previous head-to-head match-ups were league clashes
• Sacramento State is 2-2 on the road against Southern Utah, but the two haven't met in Cedar City since 2018, with the Thunderbirds posting a 3-2 victory
• The Hornets' last win in the series came in 2019, pitching a 3-0 shutout at home
• Four of the last five meetings have ended in a shutout for either team, with Sacramento State holding the scoring edge, 11-5
CONFERENCE CALL
• Sacramento State is a combined 7-6-3 all-time against Western Athletic Conference opponents entering Thursday's match
• The Hornets have only faced four of the league's eight women's soccer playing members: Seattle U (0-2-1), California Baptist (0-1-2), Utah Valley (1-0), and Southern Utah (6-3)
• Sacramento State last faced a WAC opponent on Sept. 17 of last season, drawing with California Baptist, 1-1, at home
• If you count the matches against Southern Utah when they were members of the Big Sky, the Hornets are winless in their last three (0-2-1) meetings with current WAC members, last posting a 3-0 win over the Thunderbirds in 2019
HERRMAN CLAIMS WEEKLY HONORS
• Senior defender Cassandra Herrman was named the Big Sky Co-Defensive Player of the Week on Sept. 17
• It is her first career weekly award from the league office and the second for a Hornet this season (Izzy Palmatier, Sept. 3)
• Dating back to last season, Sacramento State's last four weekly award winners have been on the defensive end
• Herrman helped spearhead a defense that logged its second shutout of the season in a 1-0 win over CSUN
• Three days later, taking on her old team in Cal State Bakersfield, she provided the assist on teammate Abigail Lopez's game-tying goal with just 39 seconds remaining in regulation, collecting her first assist as a Hornet.
TOP 10 FOR NUMBER 10
• Lopez is now among the top 10 goal scorers in the history of the program following her performances against CSUN and Cal State Bakersfield, finishing with a pair of goals on 10 shots in an unbeaten weekend
• The three-time All-Big Sky Conference honoree enters this week's matches with 13 career scores to go with five assists for 31 points
• Her 13 goals are now tied for ninth on the school's all-time list, matching Tisha Smith (1994-95) and Adaurie Dayak (2013-16) while putting her one back of Elece McBride (14 from 2008-12) for eighth
• Lopez's 31 points are five back on that all-time list, trailing former teammate Aubrey Goodwill (2018-22) for 10th
• Her 108 career shots are also four back of Jessica Mackiewicz (1998-99) for 10th place
• 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)
BACK-TO-BACK
• With goals in each of the team's two matches last week, Lopez became the second Hornet to score in back-to-back contests this year
• Sophomore Ellie Farber was the first -- and did it in similar fashion, netting the opening score in a win over Houston Christian on Aug. 17 before collecting the tying score against UC Santa Barbara on Aug. 22
• Heading into Thursday's match at Southern Utah, no Hornet has scored a goal in three straight contests since Kylee Kim-Bustillos did so against California Baptist (9/8), San Jose State (9/12), and Toledo (9/15) in 2019
LOPEZ AMONG THE BEST IN THE BIG SKY
• The senior enters the week leading the Big Sky in shots per game (2.75), tied for third in overall shots (22), tied for fifth in goals (2), and tied for 10th in points (5)
FIRST FOR ALI
• Now in her third year with the program, senior midfielder Ali Fuamatu-Ma'afala finally got into the scoring column against CSUN, notching her first career assist on Abigail Lopez's game-winning goal in the 81st minute
• She became the second player to notch their first career points as Hornets this season, joining Alejandra Melendez, who had an assist on the game-tying goal against UC Santa Barbara on Aug. 22
LATE MATCH MAGIC
• Of the Hornets' six goals scored this season, three of those have come in the final 10 minutes of a match -- one of those coming in the final two minutes and another in the last 60 seconds of play
• All three have either accounted for the game-tying or game-winning scores
• Aside from Abigail Lopez's late-match heroics against CSUN (game-winner with 9:28 left) and Cal State Bakersfield (game-tying goal with :39 remaining), Ellie Farber's goal with 1:39 remaining tied the match against UC Santa Barbara on Aug. 22
• Lopez's goal with 39 seconds left was the eighth-latest goal scored in regulation in school history and the latest since Lopez scored the game-tying goal with 52 seconds remaining at Northern Colorado on Sept. 24 of last year
WHEN IT'S GOTTA BE CLEAN
• Palmatier's shutout in the team's 1-0 win over CSUN was the sixth of her career, moving her into a tie for ninth on the all-time list along with Mia Shalit (2021-23) for ninth
• She trails both Jenny Lawrence (2005-08) and Amy Seely (2000-02) by two for the No. 7 spot on the school's career list, while four more clean sheets this year will make Palmatier only the seventh Hornet keeper to reach double digits in the category
IZZY DOES IT
• Palmatier wrapped up another busy week in net for the Hornets, making seven stops in the 1-0 shutout of CSUN and five more in a dramatic draw with Cal State Bakersfield
• The seven saves against the Matadors are tied for the fifth-most in her career and she has posted three of her top-five career single-match save totals this season alone
• A career-high 11 saves came in a scoreless draw against Cal Poly on Aug. 29, followed by a 10-save performance against Oregon on Sept. 8 -- her second and third career matches with double-digit stops
• The 11 saves against the Mustangs were just one shy of breaking onto the program's all-time single-match top 10 list and were the most by a Hornet keeper since Mia Shalit finished with the same number against Northern Arizona on Oct. 21, 2022
• The 11 stops are tied for the most in a match by a Big Sky keeper as of Sept. 16, matched only by Montana's Bayliss Flynn on Sept. 8 at Wyoming, while the 10 saves against Oregon are tied for third
• Palmatier enters the week with a Big Sky Conference best 45 saves overall, stands second in both saves per match (5.63) and save percentage (.804), while standing third in shutouts (2) and goals against average (1.38)
