By Dylan Vazzano, TTU Sports Information
COOKEVILLE, Tenn. – The Tennessee Tech soccer team is back at it on Tuesday afternoon, as the Golden Eagles are in Murray, Ky. to tangle with the Racers of Murray State. First kick from Cutchin Field is scheduled for 1 p.m. CT.
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
Halfway through the club's 10-match spring slate, the Golden Eagles (3-2-0) are one of four teams in the OVC that possess a winning record at the season's midway point. SEMO and SIUE are both sitting at a perfect 5-0, while Murray hosts Tech with a 5-1 mark in its back pocket.
All five of TTU's affairs have been decided by 1-0 margins. The purple and gold are coming off a narrow loss at the defending regular-season champion, SEMO, Friday night in a contest decided late. Scoreless with just over 10 minutes left in regulation, Lexi Grote pushed one into the back of the net to give the Redhawks a lead in the 79th minute.
The SEMO score was only the second surrendered by Tech this season, a mark that is good enough for second fewest in the conference. Southeast Missouri's shutout Friday night was the squad's fourth consecutive blanking, as they lead the league with only one goal allowed in five contests.
Senior keeper Isabelle Austin is second in the OVC in save percentage at .923, having yielded only two scores while making 24 stops in the process. The Sylvania, Ohio product's 0.40 goals against average is also good enough for second in the conference.
Tech's three scores this year have come from junior Chloe Smith and freshmen Gabby Garcia and Meredith Nye. Smith's net-finder broke a scoreless draw in the 88th minute at Morehead State on Mar. 9, while Garcia's goal occurred four minutes into overtime to propel the purple and gold to a 1-0 nod vs. Eastern Illinois in the home opener on Mar. 12. Nye split the pipes in the 32nd minute to separate a scoreless deadlock in the season opener at Austin Peay on Mar. 2.
A look at Murray State
After capturing their first five tilts to begin the spring, the Racers stubbed their toe in the squad's last outing behind a 2-1 loss Friday at Jacksonville State. Trailing 1-0 early in the second half, Chloe Barnthouse squad the score with a goal in the 52nd minute, but the knot proved to be short-lived after the Gamecocks went ahead with a strike in the 61st minute.
Barnthouse's net-finder tied the 5-foot-5 freshman with Rebecca Kubin with the most scores on the team with three apiece. The pair of Racers are tied for second in the OVC with those three goals. Kubin, the former OVC Freshman of the Year and a two-time All-OVC second-teamer, has 25 goals in her Murray career.
Overall, the Racers lead the OVC with 102 shots and are second in the league with 13 goals.
Defensively, Jenna Villacres has been the only Racer to appear between the pipes this season. The sophomore out of Westerville, Ohio has let up seven goals and has collected 19 saves for a .731 save percentage and a 1.15 goals against average.
Murray was selected to finish first in the league's predicted order of finish following an 8-2-0 2019 conference campaign that ended with a 2-1 loss to Belmont in the OVC Tournament semifinals. Including this spring, the Racers have posted a combined 45-6-5 record in league play since the 2015 season.
Inside the Series
Murray leads the all-time series, 12-8-2, over the Golden Eagles, but Tech did seize the last meeting thanks to a 3-0 victory on Oct. 11, 2019 in Cookeville. At the time, the loss was only the fourth Racer defeat in OVC play over a four-year stretch and ended up being one of only two conference defeats suffered by the club in 2019. The Racers registered a win in the last Murray get-together with a 2-0 nod on Sept. 28, 2018.
Photo by Jim Dillon
