By Dylan Vazzano, TTU Sports Information
COOKEVILLE, Tenn. – The Tennessee Tech soccer team gets set to tie a ribbon on the month of August, as the Golden Eagles will welcome ETSU to Cookeville for a Thursday evening home affair for TTU's fourth match of the season. Kickoff with the Buccaneers is scheduled for 6 p.m. CT.
Admission to Tech Soccer Field is free of charge. The match will be broadcast live on ESPN+. Click here to watch. Live stats will also be available. Click here to view.
A look at Tennessee Tech
The Golden Eagles (0-2-1) will be looking to check the win column for the first time this fall after opening the year with a 1-1 tie at WKU, before back-to-back losses to Chattanooga and Liberty in the last two times on the pitch. Tech's tangle with Liberty on Aug. 25 in the club's last contest against the preseason No. 1 team in Conference USA saw the purple and gold yield a pair of second-half scores on the way to a 2-0 defeat.
Maggie Conrad was forced into a career-high eight saves in the loss to the Lady Flames to push her season stop total to 19 in three matches, tied for the highest amount in the OVC. The 5-foot-7 junior's 6.33 saves per tilt is the highest in the league, while her .826 save percentage is good enough for second best in the conference.
Offensively, Tech's lone goal this year came in the season-opening draw at WKU on Aug. 17, with Abigail Davis finding the back of the net to square the score in the 85th minute. Davis' net-finder came off a corner, with Sami Cullum tabbing her first career assist in the deadlocking goal.
Freshman Neve Renwick leads the squad in shots this season behind seven, a mark that puts the Sheffield, England native in third in the OVC in that department. Katie Toney is the only other Golden Eagle inside the conference's top 10 thanks to five total attempts.
TTU returns to Tech Soccer Field for the club's second Cookeville get-together this year after being upended 1-0 by Chattanooga in the home opener on Aug. 20. All four of Tech's non-conference home contests are against schools from the Volunteer State. The Golden Eagles will host Lipscomb on Sept. 10 and Middle Tennessee on Sept. 17.
A look at ETSU
The Bucs (2-1-1) are Cookeville bound following the club's most impressive result of the year thanks to a 3-0 nod at Gardner Webb on Aug. 27. After a scoreless first 45 minutes, ETSU went wild in the second stanza behind goals in the 55th, 62nd and 90th minutes. Sinoxolo Cesane was responsible for two of the team's three goals, with Ruby Teixeria assisting on both scores. Overall, Cesane leads the Bucs with three goals this season to tie for second in the Southern Conference, while Teixeira's pair of helpers is good enough to tie the West Virginia transfer for third in the SoCon.
ETSU's lone defeat this year came at the hands of No. 25 Tennessee behind a 3-1 loss on Aug. 24. Cesane also split the pipes in that affair with a match-tying goal in the 49th minute, before the Vols went ahead in the 62nd minute and tacked on in the 72nd minute. The defeat to UT is the only tilt out of four in which ETSU has allowed a goal. The Buccaneers blanked Garner-Webb, topped Davidson 2-0 on Aug. 20 and played Kennesaw State to a scoreless draw in the season opener on Aug. 17.
Ashton Blair has played all but 17 minutes in net this year for ETSU and has collected 13 saves to go along with three goals surrendered for a .813 save percentage and a 0.79 goals against average.
Inside the series
Thursday's match will mark the 19th meeting in the all-time set. Tech is in charge of a narrow 7-6-5 advantage, and while the two clubs met in an exhibition last year in Cookeville, the last official get-together in the all-time series was a scoreless knot on Sept. 17, 2021 in Johnson City.
Photo by Jim Dillon
