By Ron Smith
August 31, 2023
 
(POMONA, Calif.) Opening up the 2023 season on the road, Westmont Women's Soccer played to a 2-2 draw against the Broncos of Cal Poly Pomona on Thursday afternoon.
 
"It wasn't our night to win, but we played well," stated Westmont's head coach Jenny Jaggard. "We earned a tie tonight.
 
"With games like this, I am proud of the team for holding the tie, because it was one of those games where everyone was gunning for each other. It was extremely physical and there were a lot of fouls."
 
Westmont scored first, tallying a goal in the seventh minute when Grace Duckens finished a pass from Sydney Reese.
 
"We played some beautiful passes and connected to Sydney near the edge of the box," described Jaggard. "Sydney beat her defender on the dribble and sent a hard pass along the ground to the back post where Duckens was running on. Grace tapped it in for a goal.
 
"Probably 10 to 15 minutes later, Cal Poly tied it up. I feel like it was very poor defending on our part. The player (Jaclyn Cuevas) was way too open on the box, found her feet, touched it around our defender and blasted a high ball over our goalkeeper."
 
Westmont made the score 2-1 in the second half with a goal from Amarys Machado.
 
"Shayna Stock threw the ball deep into the box," recalled Jaggard. "Amarys touched it and it hit a defender. Then, she battled in a 50-50 contest, came out with the ball and blasted it into the goal from the top of the box."
 
However, the Broncos rallied again to even the score on a goal from 30 yards out by Tara Oper.
 
After the game, Jaggard was pleased with the performance of a number of her players.
 
"I thought Ande Seigel played really well in the six with some of the best defending I've seen," noted Jaggard. "Our sophomore transfer from Jessup, Kennah Shaffer, had a breakout moment. We needed her pace at right back. So, she helped us with that and she also sent some deep free kicks. So, we have another player who can hit a deep ball.
 
"Angelina Garcia had a really good game as a wing forward. She was one of the players who created some dangerous moments for us. Obviously, Amarys scored one of the goals and was in a lot of the plays. She held the ball a little bit better for us.
 
"Amelia Villa and Sydney Reese were rock stars in this game. They covered so much ground, produced dangerous passing and quality defending.
 
"Both of our goalkeepers – Maya Pablos in the first half and Ellie Ludwig in the second – did well."
 
Next up for the Warriors is another road trip on Saturday, this time traveling farther east down the 210 Freeway to make their way to Cal State San Bernardino for a two o'clock game.