Southern Cal defeats Florida State to win NCAA Women's College Cup

by Umberto Calina 12/8/2007

(Scroll down for Friday's semifinal report)

COLLEGE STATION, TX. - Southern Cal earned a national championship here Sunday, defeating Florida State 2-0 in the Women's College Cup Final. The Women of Troy got goals from Marihelen Tomer and Janessa Currier..

In the world of college sports, 2007 has been a banner year for surprises. NCAA Women’s soccer has seen its own perpetual favorites, North Carolina, Notre Dame, and UCLA depart to make room for a championship game which for the first time in 25 years featured two first first-time finalists, Southern Cal and Florida State University.

In the semifinal matches on Friday, the 14th ranked Seminoles outlasted Notre Dame (3-2) after the Irish had already eliminated North Carolina while the 9th ranked Women of Troy finally won over UCLA (2-1) after almost a decade of frustration.

Another oddity of this, the 26th NCAA final is that both participants were outplayed in their respective semifinal games, showing on again that soccer, for all the lip service paid to the “on any given day” psychology, can still be a remarkably cruel sport when it comes to puncturing expectations.

With uncharacteristic candor for a first-year coach, Southern Cal’s Ali Khosroshahin admitted that he was unhappy with the level of his team’s play but nonetheless indicated that he and his team were not satisfied with merely playing in the final. He did not state his goal directly but cagily rephrased the message conveyed to him when he was hired: “We evaluate you on national championships.”

Khosroshahin’s counterpart, Mark Krikorian, whose 2005 Florida State coaching debut was a dominating 4:0 win over the then 18th ranked Women of Troy, was less concerned with how coaches are evaluated, simply telling his players to enjoy the moment and have fun. To convey that message convincingly, Krikorian must be quite a polyglot, for he has built the axis of his starting team with international players: Erin McNulty in the goal (Canada), Katrin Schmidt (defense, Germany), Kirsten van de Ven (midfield, Netherlands), Mami Yamaguchi (Midfield/Forward, Japan) and Sanna Talonen (forward, Finland).

Whatever the language in which Krikorian addresses his team, from the very beginning of this final game and the free kick against Southern Cal in the second minute it was clear that the most intriguing matchups would pit the potent Seminole attack, of Yamaguchi, Talonen, and Amanda DaCosta, all of whom specialize in punishing defensive mistakes, against Southern Cal’s towering central defenders Kasey Johnson and Janessa Currier both of whom like to bring up the ball. The mainly home grown Women of Troy got into the final game thanks to Amy Rodriguez’s opportunistic striking, but the credit for getting to the final four goes primarily to Kristen Olsen’s brilliance in goal and the defensive diligence taught by Harold Warren, a long time ODP scout for Southern Cal and now Khosroshahin’s Associate Head Coach for the University that shares the region’s name.

Florida State’s slowness to clear the ball from its area invited the Women of Troy to apply some pressure, and they did so during the second five minutes of the game. The pressure resulted in a pair of wasted corner kicks, and a ninth minute shot by Ashli Sandoval that was fuelled more by optimism than the strength of the hips behind the ball. McNulty made an easy save.

Florida State countered, mainly by way of DaCosta’s irrepressible dribble, but her efforts resulted only in a corner which Yamaguchi tamely sent into the side netting.

Talonen’s size and speed along with the tendency to lurk, probe, and switch sides with Yamaguchi produced the firdt serious threat in the fifteenth minute but Olsen held on.

Southern Cal played seven minutes without Sandoval or a substitute, but the Seminoles failed to take advantage of the numerical superiority although Yamaguchi narrowly missed on a long low shot to the left of diving Olsen.

Exactly halfway though the first half, Olsen mishandled a high ball but the resulting mayhem in the penalty box produced only in a foul against Florida State.

With 20 minutes to go, Southern Cal’s Marihelen Tomer put her team ahead 1-0 by heading in a ball that had bounced back on her shot, and to which Florida’s defense was too slow to react. A minute later USC almost doubled its lead on a very similar play, with Rodriguez taking the shot that hit the cross bar and bounced back in Currier’s path.

In response, the Seminoles increased pressure through the middle, with Dacosta’s passes resulting in another great diving fingertip save by Olsen and several attempts by Yamaguchi whom Kasey Johnson was rendering curiously ineffectual by denying her space, preventing her from turning and thus forcing her to take long but ineffective shots. With Currier doing the same to Yamaguchi’s running mate Talonen, and with Ashley Nick occupying DaCosta’s attention, the Seminoles resorted to the long passing game which the Women of Troy had little trouble diagnosing and cutting off.

Yamaguchi’s long shot over Olsen’s goal ended the first half, which the coaches had expected to be slow and deliberate but which turned to be anything but. Southern Cal had outshot the highest scoring team in the nation and went into the locker room with a deserved 1-0 lead.

As is usually the case with trailing teams, the Seminoles cam out of the locker room with determination. First Rachel Lim’s well struck shot produced a corner, quickly followed by another one. Although the ball ended up in the net, a Seminole foul was responsible for disallowing the goal.

A quick counter by Erika Sutton started a series of corner kicks and free kicks that pinned the Seminoles in their half for a good long time.

As the fans broke out into the Seminole fight song, Lim delivered a great ball to Talonen who, surprised to find herself surrounded by so much space, overswung on the ball and mishit it.

Once Southern Cal defense regained its shape, it kept pushing up, putting more and more manicured Texas real estate between the Seminole forwards and Olsen’s charmed goal. For the fist 30 minutes of the second half, we got the type of play we expected in the first half, cautious and deliberate. Then on Sandoval’s corner kick, Janessa Currier beat Rachel Lim to the ball, shot it, collected the rebound and put in the net. The Florida State fight song died down.

With eight minutes left Florida State’s Libby Gianeskis, superb in the first semifinal game, was sent off for having been unfortunate enough to be the last player on defense while pulling on Rodriguez’s shirt.

Down to ten players, the Seminole tried to mount an improbable comeback, but Olsen was there to parry the ball into the corner twice.

As the game ended, it was clear that the Women of Troy have an uncanny ability to adjust. And as his players headed for the celebratory center of the field hug, it was also clear that the margin of safety for Ali Khosroshahin’s job safety just got considerably bigger.