Senior midfielder
Kaisa Rogers (Springville, Utah/Springville HS) scored twice, and sophomore forward
Darian McCloy (Herriman, Utah/Herriman HS) added a goal and assist, to lead the Dixie State to a 3-1 victory over BYU-Hawai'i Thursday afternoon at Hansen Stadium. DSU won its second-straight match and improved to 4-5-0 overall, 2-3-0 in PacWest play, while the Seasiders fell to 2-5-2, 1-2-1 in league action.
Dixie State got on the board in the 33
rd minute as freshman
Nichole Mertz (Springville, Utah/Springville HS) fired a flip throw into the BYU-H penalty box and after a quick touch by senior
Jasmine Arollo (Glendale, Ariz./Apollo HS), McCloy booted a shot into the upper right corner of the goal to give DSU a 1-0 lead.
Rogers padded the DSU lead late in the 61
st minute as she intercepted a Seasider clearing attempt and went top shelf past BYU-H keeper Kelsey East. The two-goal advantage was more than enough for the Storm defense, which held BYU-Hawai'i without a shot attempt for the first 62 minutes of the match.
Despite the stout DSU defense, the Seasiders would pick up a goal at the 74:56 mark of the match when Kristine Reynolds converted on a penalty kick attempt to cut the DSU lead in half at 2-1. However Dixie State would get its two-goal advantage back just 15 seconds later when Rogers corralled a cross from sophomore
Courtney Fryer (Spanish Fork, Utah/Maple Mountain HS) and touch pass from McCloy to score from 10-yards out to push the lead to 3-1.
DSU's defense did the rest as the unit held BYU-H to one more shot attempt in the final 14-plus minutes to seal the victory.
"I am very proud of the team today," Head Coach
Kacey Bingham said." "Darian [McCloy] and Kaisa [Rogers] had stand out performances and defensively we were very clean. We were disappointed with the the PK call, but responded well with a goal 15 seconds later."
DSU finished with 18 shots, nine on frame, with McCloy leading the way with four shots-three on goal. DSU netminder
Sarah Beecher (Kaysville, Utah/Davis HS) made two saves in her first start of the season in picking up the win in goal.
Dixie State will play host to Hawai'i Hilo Saturday, Oct. 10, at 4:30 p.m., at Hansen Stadium.