Coach Brian Pensky’s tenure in College Park has seen its share of firsts for the Terrapins women’s soccer team.
On Oct. 24, 2010, the Terps defeated North Carolina for the first time in program history. Later, it earned its first-ever No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament.
As the Terps continue to pursue their ultimate first — a national championship — Pensky had to handle another on his team’s five-day road trip to Florida.
“In my time, we’ve gone three times and we’ve never earned a point,” he said Tuesday. “We’re 0-6.”
Not anymore. With a 3-0 blanking of the No. 17 Seminoles last night in Tallahassee, Fla., the Terps earned their first conference win in the state since 2002.
“There was a reason why we haven’t won here,” Pensky said last night. “This is a hard trip. We’re coming off a 110-minute game against Wake and it was a long travel day with two flights. I thought that our legs were a little heavy, to be honest. But we had three great goals.”
The No. 16 Terps (9-2-4, 3-2-2 ACC) were a picture of offensive perfection in the first 45 minutes of play, staking themselves a decisive 3-0 lead on only three shots that involved only three players.
Two of those goals came in the first 10 minutes of play. Midfielder Danielle Hubka scored in the sixth minute from 20 yards out on a pass from forward Ashley Grove, and midfielder Becky Kaplan found the net in the ninth minute after shaking her opponent along the endline.
Grove, making her first start since Sept. 18 against Virginia Tech, added the Terps’ third goal in the 24th minute on a header assisted by Hubka and Kaplan.
The three goals the Terps scored were the most they had recorded since a 5-1 victory over American on Sept. 7.
“We’ve obviously had four 0-0 ties and we’ve had some trouble scoring, but very fortunately that wasn’t the case tonight,” Pensky said.
The Terps still had to endure an assault from a Florida State offense that had been averaging almost two goals per game in ACC play coming into the matchup. The Seminoles (9-6-0, 2-5-0) took 21 shots last night, forcing goalkeeper Yewande Balogun to make 10 saves for the Terps.
“Yewande was amazing in goal tonight,” Pensky said. “She saved a penalty kick and made probably four other difficult saves and then just held the ones that you hope a good goalkeeper holds, but you never know. There were well-struck balls that I’m very glad this game didn’t end up 3-2, because she deserved the shutout.”
With Florida State constantly attacking in the latter stages of the first half and throughout the second, Pensky had to turn to strategy to not only keep the Seminoles off the board but also keep his team fresh for the rest of the road trip.
Little-used midfielder Shade Pratt entered the game as a midfielder to mark Florida State’s Tori Huster, and Grove was charged with trailing defender Ines Jaurena for stages during the game.
Pensky said afterward he was worried about how his defense is holding up, as all four of the Terps’ starting defenders played 90 minutes last night. But other important pieces such as midfielder Olivia Wagner and forward Jasmyne Spencer saw between 30 and 50 minutes of play.
With his first win at Florida State out of the way, Pensky will turn the team’s sights to its first win at Miami on Sunday afternoon. The Hurricanes upset No. 9 Boston College last night, and Pensky isn’t taking anything for granted.
“We’re going to get to Miami tomorrow and get some recovery massages down there,” Pensky said, “and hopefully put our minds and bodies in a position to get some results on Sunday.”
dgallen@umdbk.com
