The St. John’s University Women’s Soccer Team continues to struggle this 2019 season, losing against Marquette University on Thursday and Butler on Sunday, making their season record 4-10, and their record in the Big East Conference 1-4.
The Red Storm had developed an early lead against Marquette, with redshirt junior Zsani Kajan putting two points on the board in the first half, one within the first ten minutes with an assist coming from junior Alex Madden and redshirt freshman Addison Hornsley, the other with less than ten minutes remaining on the clock, freshman Jessica Garziano setting her up. Garziano’s assist marked her fourth of the season. This game brought Kajan’s total number of goals of the season to six, making her the lead scorer on the team.
However, despite leading 2-0 at the end of the first half, Marquette was able to make a comeback, scoring at the 61st minute of the game, then 20 minutes later, tying the game and forcing overtime. Then, when neither team was able to score in the first overtime, the teams went into double overtime, where Marquette was able to quickly score within the first minute of the sudden-death period, ending the game with a score of 3-2.
On Sunday, the Red Storm lost once again, falling to the Butler Bulldogs in Indianapolis. Despite the game being scoreless through the first half, the Bulldogs were able to score in the 78th minute and the game ended with Butler winning 1-0.
The defense made the victory difficult for Butler, as St. John’s redshirt junior Meredith Reinhardt had seven saves throughout the game. Kajan, Madden and Garziano led the team with shots in the mashup, each with two and both of Garziano’s shots on goal, but the team was unable to get the ball past the Bulldog goalie, ending the game with a loss for St. John’s.
This 2019 season has posed a new difficulty for the Red Storm allowing their games to go into overtime. Of the 14 games the team has played this season, five have gone into overtime, four of those games into double overtime. St. John’s has only been able to win one of those games, beating Yale 2-1 on Aug. 30 in double overtime, with a game-winning goal coming from Kajan.
Part of the issue this season for the Red Storm can be seen as the disparity between their success in the second half to the first half of their games. In the regular season, seven of their goals have occured within the first half of games, while two come from the second half, one in double overtime. Meanwhile, their opponents score most of their goals during the second half, as, out of the 23 goals scored against the Red Storm, 14 have come from the second half. Teams are being given the opportunity to make a comeback and they are taking advantage of it.
Even with the loss against Marquette, the Women’s Soccer Team seems to find their greatest success when playing at home, as all of their wins have been at Belson Stadium, and they are 0-6 for away games. Hopefully, with half of their remaining games being away games, and all of them being conference games, they will be able to prove their statistics wrong and find success off their home field.
The team returns home to Belson Stadium on Sunday, Oct. 20, at 1:00 p.m., where they will be facing off against Big East Conference rival Xavier University. Including this game, the Red Storm only has four games left on the schedule before the Big East Conference Tournament, which starts in the beginning of November.
