Women's Soccer Squares Off vs. Iowa State on Thursday at Buck Shaw

Women's Soccer Squares Off vs. Iowa State on Thursday at Buck Shaw

SANTA CLARA, Calif. – Coming off a big win against a top-20 team, Santa Clara women's soccer plays just one game for the second consecutive week. The Broncos welcome Iowa State to the Mission Campus on Thurs., Sept. 12 at 7 p.m. Santa Clara's 1-0 win over Maryland on Sept. 6 put the Broncos at 3-2-0 in 2013. This will be first matchup between the two teams.

"I thought we had a good performance last week," said Santa Clara head coach Jerry Smith. "The results are one things, and we're happy about the win, but from a coaching standpoint we're far more focused on our performance and we felt we performed well. We didn't give up a lot of chances and were able to have some sustained attacks. We'd certainly like to score more than one goal a game so we're going to spend a lot of time working on our attacking-third play and finishing more chances." 

Julie Johnston leads the team in goals (3) and points (6) while scoring one game-winning goal this year. Morgan Marlborough has scored one goal and has a team-high three assists to place second on the team with five points. Sofia Huerta and Mariana Galvan each have one goal apiece while Julie Vass has a single assist. Huerta leads the team in shots with 16 and shots on goal with nine. Marlborough has 12 shots and five on goal while Johnston has 11 shots and six on goal. Andi Tostanoski has made 25 saves with a .833 save percentage and picked up three shutouts in five games.

"We're really seeing some dynamic combination play from Morgan and Julie," said Smith. "What's wonderfully surprising about Morgan is what a good passer she is. We're very pleased with what she's doing and her ability to set up goals. Goal scorers often times are streaky. She just needs one or two to get the ball rolling and we're hoping that will happen this Thursday."

Instead of worrying about what their opponent will do, Smith and the Broncos plan to focus on what they need to do to be successful.

"Our focus is going to be mainly on us," said Smith. "We went into the opening weekend trying to figure out how to play well against our opponents and didn't do what we needed to do to be successful. Our focus this week will be on things we need to improve upon and those are our attacking-third play and attacking dead-ball situations."

Iowa State enters the week with a 4-2-0 record and is coming off a 4-0 win vs. North Dakota. The Cyclones have outscored opponents 11-6 and outshot foes 93-51 including 43-24 in shots on goal. They have scored six goals in the first half and five in the second half while dominating the first half with 41 shots to opponents 16. Opponents have put on the pressure in the second half, with Iowa State making 15 saves against just three in the first half.

 "When you play a team like Iowa State that doesn't have a key goal scorer it can be difficult to game plan for," said Smith. "Often times when a team has a prolific goal scorer you can focus your plan off of what she is doing, You don't know which one of Iowa State's players is going to be the dangerous player on the day. Because there isn't one player we'll focus on is both good news and bad news."

Jennifer Dominguez leads the team with three goals and is tied for the team lead with two assists to give her a team-best eight points. Koree Willer and Erin Green are tied for second with two goals each while Willer as added one assist. Emily Goldstein has one goal and two assists while three other Cyclones have one goal each and five others have at least one assist. Maddie Jobe has played all 540 minutes in net and is allow a 1.0 goals per game. Jobe has made 18 saves for a .750 save percentage and has picked up two shutouts.