Freshman Courtney Petersen (Canton, Mich.) delivered in a big way on Friday night, providing a goal and an assist as Virginia (2-0-0) picked up a 2-0 win over Cal Poly (0-1-2) in the Virginia Nike Soccer Classic.
Petersen connected on both scoring plays late in the first half to give the Cavaliers what proved the be the game-winning goal and the insurance goal needed to pick up the win over a physical Mustang team.
“The ball movement was good tonight and we created enough chances to break the game open,” said Virginia head coach Steve Swanson. “We competed very hard. We improved as a team tonight and that was something we were looking for from last week to this week. We improved in a lot of areas and got contributions from a lot of players.
“Cal Poly is a good team. They’re hard and they are tough to break down at times. I think they will win their share of games this year, so that was a good win for us.”
Virginia got on the board in the 31st minute when sophomore Veronica Latsko (Venetia, Pa.) sent a cross from the far side of the box to the foot of Petersen on the near side. Petersen gathered the ball and fired the shot into the goal give the Cavaliers the 1-0 lead.
Petersen and the Cavaliers struck again minutes later, this time converting in the 39th minute of play to give Virginia the 2-0 lead on the Mustangs. Peterson sent a cross in from the near side of the field where a leaping Emily Sonnett (Marietta, Ga.) put a head on it and drove the ball into the net.
Virginia held the 2-0 lead at the half and held off Cal Poly in the second half to pick up the win.
The Cavaliers will return to action on Sunday, facing Delaware at 2:30 p.m. to close out the weekend tournament at Klöckner Stadium. The Blue Hens (2-1-0) fell to Richmond by a score of 4-0 on Friday afternoon in the opening game of the tournament.
Share
Chris Graham
