Colorado State University Athletics
CSU Soccer Travels to Portland State, Hosts Omaha
9/14/2016 12:00:00 AM | Women's Soccer
Colorado State Rams (2-4-0) at Portland State Vikings (1-5-0)
Friday, September 16 | 2 p.m. MT/1 p.m. PT
Hillsboro Stadium | Hillsboro, Ore.
Coverage: Live Streaming | Live Stats
Colorado State Rams (2-4-0) vs. Omaha Mavericks (2-4-0)
Sunday, September 18 | 1 p.m. MT
The Lagoon | Fort Collins, Colo.
Coverage: CSURams.com/videos | Live Stats
Promotions: National Cheeseburger Day (first 250 fans receive a cheeseburger)
Colorado State Soccer: Notes | Twitter
FORT COLLINS, Colo. – After a week away from action, the Colorado State women’s soccer team returns to the pitch this weekend for a road match at Portland State and a match against Omaha at The Lagoon.
CSU (2-4-0) opens the weekend with its third consecutive road match, a 2 p.m. MT (1 p.m. PT) contest on Friday at Portland State (1-5-0). The Rams return home to close the weekend, hosting Omaha at 1 p.m. MT at The Lagoon on Sunday.
The Rams are 1-1-0 at home this season, with its most recent result at The Lagoon coming in the form of a dramatic 2-1 win over SIUE. Omaha has only played one road match this season, falling 2-1 last weekend at Missouri State. Portland State has dropped each of its two home contests in 2016.
All season long, the Rams will have special promotions at The Lagoon. Sunday’s match is National Cheeseburger Day, and the first 250 fans to arrive to the Rams’ contest against Omaha will receive a free cheeseburger.
Live stats will be available on CSURams.com for both contests. Portland State will make a live stream available for Friday’s match, while Sunday’s match can be found on CSURams.com/videos and on the MW Network. Each can also be accessed through its respective link on the soccer schedule page on CSURams.com.
Quickly
- Five different players have scored goals for the Rams this season: Amy Eckert, Alex Lanning, Kaija Ornes, Beth Plentl and Janelle Stone.
- Ornes is CSU’s leading scorer this season, pacing the Rams with two goals and four points.
- Game-winning goals have been accounted for by Ornes (at Denver on Aug. 19) and Lanning (vs. SIUE on Aug. 28) this season.
- Stone ranks second on CSU with three points this season, which includes one goal and one of the Rams’ two assists. Hannah Gerdin, who ranks second on CSU’s all-time career points list, has the Rams’ other assist.
- Freshmen goalkeepers Sydney Hall and Natalie Dierickx have split time in goal this season, with each making three starts in 2016.
- Dierickx is 1-2-0 with a team-high 15 saves and a 1.60 goals against average, while Hall is 1-1-0 with 13 saves, a 2.00 GAA and a shutout.
- Shelby Bowden paces the team with 536 minutes played this season. The senior defenseman has seen the field for all 90 minutes of regulation in five of six matches in 2016.
- Beth Plentl leads the team with nine shots taken this season. Five of the sophomore’s nine shots have been on goal, also a team high.
Record Watch
- Senior midfielder Amy Eckert, who has played in 56 matches throughout her career, needs one more appearance to tie the program record for games played in a career and two appearances to break the record.
- CSU’s all-time games played record is held by Megan Speed, who played in 57 contests from 2013-15. Eckert is currently tied with Erika Bratschun, who played in 56 matches from 2013-15.
- Hannah Gerdin is already approaching CSU’s scoring records in her sophomore season, needing just two points to tie Gianna Bertana’s career points record (15) and three to break it.
- Gerdin is also one goal shy of Bertana’s career goals scored record (6). Bertana competed for the Rams from 2014-15.
All-Time Against This Week's Foes
- Colorado State has met each of this weekend’s opponents once, taking the pitch against Portland State in 2014 and against Omaha in 2015.
- Colorado State defeated Omaha last season on Sept. 18, 2015 in Omaha, Neb. in a dramatic 1-0, double-overtime win. In the final minute of the second overtime period, then-senior defenseman Jessica Stauffer scored off of a corner kick situation to lift the Rams to the win.
- The Rams fell in their only previous matchup with Portland State, a 3-0 contest at The Lagoon on Sept. 5, 2014.
All-Time vs. Portland State (0-1-0)
9/5/2014 – Home - L, 0-3
All-Time vs. Omaha (1-0-0)
9/18/2015 – Away – W, 1-0 (2OT)
Scouting the Portland State Vikings
- The Portland State Vikings recently picked up their first win of the season, defeating Mountain West foe Nevada, 1-0. The Vikings’ Morgan Matthews scored in the 67th minute to help PSU knock off the Wolfpack. The Vikings, who play at Hillsboro Stadium in Hillsboro, Ore., are 0-2-0 at home this season.
- Matthews and Krystal de Ramos are tied for the team lead with two goals and four points apiece. Each of Katie Forsee and Aurora Bodenhamer have three points on one goal and one assist apiece. Kasey Isobe has one assist in 2016.
- The Vikings are led in goal by Abbie Faingold, who has the team’s lone shutout and a team-high 21 saves. Ashton Blanksma has seen two starts this season, and has 11 saves with a 2.96 GAA.
Scouting the Omaha Mavericks
- The Omaha Mavericks have played five of six games this season at home, picking up both wins at the Mavericks’ Caniglia Field. Omaha’s wins are over UMKC and North Dakota, each by a score of 2-0.
- Omaha, who plays the Rams at the Lagoon on Sunday, fell in its only road match this season, a 2-1 result at Missouri State.
- The Mavericks are paced offensively by Carlie Cook, who has 10 points on a team-high four goals and two assists. Omaha has seven total assists, and is led in the category by Emily Romero, who has three.
- Omaha has started three different goalkeepers thus far in 2016, with Haley Shelton making three starts out of six. Shelton is 1-2-0 with a team-high 18 saves, a 1.45 GAA and one of Omaha’s two shutouts. Goalkeepers Erin Bunker and Katlyn Schochenmaker combined for the Mavericks’ other shutout.
The Lagoon - Home of the Rams
- Located on the field just west of the Lory Student Center on the Colorado State campus, The Lagoon serves as the home of Rams Soccer.
- Free parking is available for all home matches starting an hour before the game in the Moby Arena parking lot, located at the northeast corner of Shields and Elizabeth Streets.
Save!
- Through six matches this season, the Colorado State women’s soccer team paces the Mountain West in saves, totaling 35 as a team. The Rams also have the highest saves per match rate in the conference, recording 5.83 saves on average.
- Freshman Natalie Dierickx ranks amongst the Mountain West’s top goalkeepers in several major categories, highlighted by the league’s third best saves per match rate (5.00). Additionally, Dierickx ranks seventh in the conference in save percentage (.789) and ninth in the league in saves (15).
- Each of Dierickx and redshirt freshman Sydney Hall have made three starts in the net this season. Hall has 13 of the Rams’ 35 saves, and is 1-1-0 with a 2.00 goals against average. Hall posted the Rams’ only shutout this season, making one save in CSU’s season-opening 2-0 win against Denver.
Spreading the Goals Around
- Over the first six games of the season, Colorado State has scored six times, with the total accounted for by five different players. Sophomore forward Kaija Ornes leads the club with two goals.
- Three of five CSU goal-scorers are sophomores or younger, including Ornes, sophomore defender/midfielder Beth Plentl and freshman midfielder Alex Lanning. Senior midfielder Amy Eckert and junior midfielder Janelle Stone account for the remaining goals with one apiece.
Back Again
- The Rams return seven starters and 15 letterwinners from last year's roster, including a bulk of their offensive production. Colorado State's Hannah Gerdin had a team-high 12 points on five goals last year. Gerdin has notched the most points in a single season for a CSU player, and is approaching all-time career points leader Gianna Bertana (15).
- Colorado State is hoping that redshirt senior Taylor Nelson will provide a bigger impact this season on both sides of the field. Nelson returns from a five-point performance last year, the most from a CSU defender, and also had the third-most shots on the roster last season. Paige Brandt also returns to the roster as the only goalkeeper with collegiate game experience.
Record-Setting Freshman In 2015
- In her first collegiate season last year, current sophomore Hannah Gerdin made an immediate impact, leading the Rams with 12 points.
- Gerdin added her fifth goal of the season versus New Mexico after heading a free kick in the 15th minute to give the Rams an early 1-0 lead.
- Gerdin's 12 points on the season were a freshman class and overall school record at Colorado State, while her five goals are a program record for the most goals in a single season.
- Down 2-0 at Air Force with five minutes to play, Gerdin led a furious comeback, finding the back of the net twice in the waning moments to send the match to overtime. Gerdin was just the third player in CSU history to have a multi-goal match to her name.
- Gerdin is approaching the mark for most career points in CSU program history. The current leader is Gianna Bertana, who recorded 15 points over her career. During the 2015 season, Gerdin registered a team-high 48 shots, and also led the team with 24 shots on goal. Gerdin tallied the first points of her career with her first goal in the Rams' 2-1 loss at Grand Canyon.
Fourth Year of Program
- Colorado State head coach Bill Hempen guides the Rams into its fourth year as a program. A 27-year head coaching veteran, Hempen was the first and only coach ever hired in the program's history, with CSU's first season of play in 2013.
- The Rams, who hope to qualify for their first Mountain West postseason tournament and contend for the title, were picked in the Mountain West coaches' poll to finish 12th.
Exhibition a Sign of Things to Come?
- CSU battled with visiting Washington State to a 1-1 tie in exhibition play earlier this fall. The two teams battled throughout the first half but neither team could find the back of the net and went into the halftime break scoreless. Less than 10 minutes into the second half, CSU got possession and moved it down the left side of the field.
- WSU interrupted the flow briefly before sophomore Hannah Gerdin recovered the ball, went in off the left side and drove a shot that went off the Cougar keeper high. The shot spun hard when it hit the ground and slid into the net for a 1-0 Rams advantage.
- In the 88th minute, the 2015 NCAA Tournament squad got its lone goal after a Cougar was dragged down in the box and Kailana Johnson slotted the penalty kick for the tying goal. Due to the nature of the exhibition, no overtime was played.
