CLAREMONT, Calif. – The University of Redlands Women's Soccer team saw their 2022 season come to an end Wednesday afternoon in the Semi-Finals of the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) Tournament falling 3-2 to the top seeded Sagehens of Pomona-Pitzer.
Redlands fought their way back from a 3-0 deficit with less than ten minutes to play tacking on back-to-back connections from Sami Salinas (Foothill Ranch, CA) and Peyton Fendrich (Clackamas, OR) that made it a one score game. But the comeback would come up short as Pomona-Pitzer would hold on to advance to the Championship Game.
The first offensive opportunity in the game was a shot from the Sagehens that Courtney Stewart (San Jose, CA) was able to corral in the fifth minute.
Then, in the 11th minute Charlie Baum (Hesperia, CA) earned the Bulldogs their first scoring chance, getting a look off on frame but it was handled by the Sagehen keeper. Thirty seconds later Pomona-Pitzer got on the scoreboard as Amanda Khu would finish.
The remainder of the first half included ten shots between the two sides with eight of them coming from the Sagehens as Stewart made five saves to keep Redlands within striking distance heading into the break.
Out of intermission the Bulldogs and Sagehens got off to a slow start with only one shot taking place in the first ten minutes, which came from PP that was saved by Stewart. In the 57th minute the Sagehens added the eventual game-winner converting off a corner kick that moved the score to 2-0.
The Sagehens had four unanswered shots on-goal over the next 20 minutes before they thought they put the game out of reach with their third goal in the 77th.
For the Bulldogs they did not test the Sagehen keeper until the 83rd minute when Salinas successfully found the back of the net for her second goal of the season that made it 3-1 with 7:02 left.
Despite a few minutes left on the clock, it took the Bulldogs only 1:33 to add their second courtesy of Fendrich who slotted home her fourth of the season to make it a one-goal game for the first time since the early part of the second half.
In the final two minutes Tori Zielinski (Sunnyvale, CA) looked for the equalizer putting a shot on-goal against the back-up keeper for PP but she was up to the task. The final offensive chance of the game came on a corner in the final minute that would end in a ball glancing off the head of Zielinski and out past the touch line for a goal kick that ended the game.
Redlands was outshot 20-7, had four fewer corners (11-4), but were able to force four saves and had a total of six shots on-goal.
In goal Stewart ended her Bulldog career with a spectacular 11-save performance. The 11 saves are a season-high and tied her career-high from another game with Pomona-Pitzer back on September 29, 2021.
Zielinski and Baum each had two shots with a combined three shots on-goal, Fendrich and Salinas shot 1.000 each with a goal on each of their only shots of the game.
The Bulldogs end 2022 with a 6-10-1, 6-5-1 SCIAC record, but had their first taste of SCIAC Tournament competition since losing in the semifinals in 2018.