Oct. 11, 2007
ORLANDO, Fla. (www.ucfathletics.com) - After spending close to a month at home, the UCF women's soccer team gets back on the road this weekend when it travels to Tulsa Friday at 8 p.m. ET and SMU Sunday at 2 p.m. The Knights (7-2-2 overall) currently sit in a tie with UTEP for first place in Conference USA with six points thanks to a 2-0-0 league record.
The match-up with SMU is set to be televised by CSTV and fans can watch the game on tape-delay Tuesday at 8 p.m. It will be the second-straight year that the Knights and the Mustangs will have their regular-season game broadcast by the network, as UCF defeated No. 15 SMU at home in double overtime in 2006.
UCF is owners of the last three C-USA Offensive Player of the Week award winners, but has not been on the road since Sept. 16 at Ole Miss. The Knights have a league-best five weekly honors, including sophomore Yvonne Goerge (Winter Springs, Fla.) who has earned two offensive accolades. George ranks second on the team with five goals and 14 points, while classmate Courtney Whidden (Palm Harbor, Fla.) sits in first with seven tallies and 16 points.
On defense, the Knights did not allow a goal against Marshall and East Carolina Oct. 5 and Oct. 7, respectively, as senior keeper Jennifer Manis (Pensacola, Fla.) lowered her goals-against average to 1.13. Those two shutouts gave Manis three on the season.
Meanwhile, UCF's two conference victories last weekend were No. 99 and 100 in program history. The Knights, who joined their first league in 1993 (Atlantic Sun), are now 100-15-4 all-time in conference matches.
Tulsa has suffered losses in its last four outings, including at UTEP and at Colorado College, to enter the weekend with a 2-9-1 record and 0-2-0 in C-USA. The Golden Hurricane have defeated Western Kentucky and Missouri State, but have not scored more than one goal in a match this season. Jennifer Kacergis has paced Tulsa with two goals and two assists for six points in 2007, and Kendall Herclerode has played all 1119:12 minutes in net, making 73 saves and posting two shutouts.
For SMU, the C-USA preseason favorite won its league opener over Colorado College Oct. 5, but fell to UTEP two days later to stand at 5-3-1 on the season and 1-1-0 in conference play. The Mustangs have collected big victories over Kansas and TCU, and a draw vs. Texas Tech. Their other two defeats came at the hands of Arizona State and No. 13 Oklahoma State. Individually, Kim Peabody (3-1--7), Kimber Bailey (2-3--7) and Kristin Medeiros (3-1--7) all have a team-best seven points, and Ashley Gunter has 33 saves to her credit with two shutouts.
UCF claims a 1-0-1 record vs. Tulsa, while it stands at 2-3-0 vs. SMU.
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