By Ron Smith
September 11, 2023
 
(SAN MARCOS, Calif.) Westmont Women's Soccer (2-1-1) suffered its first loss of the season on Thursday at the hands of the Cougars of Cal State San Marcos (3-1). The home team prevailed by a score of 5-0. It was the Warriors' first regular season loss in two years.
 
"San Marcos was the better team today because every time we got the ball, they pressed us heavily and made us cough the ball back up," acknowledged Westmont's head coach Jenny Jaggard. "Then, they would play deep balls and get in behind us."
 
The Cougars' scored their first goal in the 37th minute on a shot by Gabby Marsh, assisted by Kaci Embree. That resulted in a 1-0 halftime score.
 
In a span of 13 minutes in the second half, however, San Marcos appeared able to score at will. In the 53rd minute, Hannah Ramos connected for a goal, assisted by Nani Kia'aina. Three minutes later Kia'aina collected another assist, this time on a goal by Lily Jensen.
 
Just another four minutes passed before Brianna Delgado scored an unassisted goal, then did the same thing five minutes later.
 
"We are going to be working a lot on defending," promised Jaggard. "Once San Marcos got a taste of that, they just kept it coming. They scored some really quality goals today and they were on us for 90 minutes.
 
"We were the better team the first 10 minutes of the game, but we didn't do the right things to score in the final moments of possession. If we had put it away in the first 15 minutes, it would have been a completely different game.
 
"This is the difference in Division II. We had days like this last year, but we didn't get exposed. We would squeak out a 1-0 win that wasn't pretty. Now, days like this are a 5-0 loss. There is no margin for the mistakes that we made today.
 
"This is not a pretty day for Westmont Women's Soccer. We have to lick our wounds, get back up and get going again for a game on Monday."
 
The Warriors will travel north to take on CSU Monterey Bay (1-1-1) in an 11:00 a.m. game on Monday.