They don’t all come easy.
The Plattsburgh State women’s soccer team found that out the hard way Tuesday night, as it gave up all four goals of a 4-1 loss to St. Lawrence in the second half.
The Saints outshot the Cardinals 14-7 in the second half alone en route to their 4-1 win.
This came after PSUC had beaten Skidmore 5-1 last Saturday.
The Cards came out strong and quick in the early goings of Saturday’s game, with senior midfielder Madeline Saccocio scoring early on a penalty kick.
“The girls came out really strong, guns-a-blazing to start,” Armellino said. “We scored within the first two minutes, so that did a good job of swinging the momentum early.”
PSUC dominated play for most of the game, outshooting Skidmore 19-12.
All five goals were scored by a trio of seniors, including Saccocio, as well as forward Sarah Haight and midfielder Cait Gagen. During the game they also had a few near misses off of passing plays between the three of them.
Armellino expanded on what it has meant for her to see their chemistry grow to where it is now.
“Seeing them combine and have fun, and see each other out there to get goals and assists has been so fun to watch,” Armellino said. “Them connecting up top as three seniors on the team has been really special.”
Senior goal-keeper Nichole Gibson played in both games, shutting out Skidmore in the first half of the game, while still playing strong in the loss to St. Lawrence. Senior goal-keeper Taylor Adamsplayed the second half against Skidmore, letting in one goal.
After the St. Lawrence game, Armellino heaped praise on Gibson.
“Even tonight, she made some amazing saves and came up big,” Armellino said. “She’s really embraced a vocal role on the team and did one heck of a job tonight keeping a few more goals out of the back of our net when we were under pressure.”
Gibson herself was more focused on putting the game behind her
“We have the SUNYAC conference coming up, so all we can do is take this loss and come to practice even harder, and put it to the next team,” Gibson said.
“Today, when were under pressure for 10 or 15 minutes, we didn’t handle it as well as we could have,” Armellino said. “For us, we’ll need to work on being able to maintain composure. Even if they score a goal or two on us, how do we mark this, how do we play this, how do we stay strong defensively? We didn’t for stretches tonight, and we paid for it.”
The Cards come away from their Tuesday game with a 4-3 record.
Next up PSUC plays SUNY Potsdam in their first SUNYAC conference game.
The Bears come into this match with 6-2-1 record. It will also be their first SUNYAC conference game.
Gagen is ready to put in the work this week and help make sure that a game like Tuesday’s won’t happen again.
“We’re going to have to work hard these next couple of days,” Gagen said. “I’m sure our coaches have scouted them, learned their formations and their key players to mark. Hopefully we’ll be ready to come out hard as soon as it starts Saturday.”
Now is when the games really start to matter, a fact not lost on Armellino. The focus will now be on containing a high-flying Potsdam offense that has already scored 23 goals in nine games.
“SUNYACs are always a great time, no matter what happens,” Armellino said. “There’s a lot of great teams. Potsdam has done well and scored a lot of goals to start the season, so we need to look to prepare for that.”
Email Ben Watson at sports@cardinalpointsonline.com
