‘Noles Run Ends In Elite Eight
Florida State’s fantastic season comes to an end with a 5-0 loss to top ranked Stanford.

11/27/10

PALO ALTO, Ca. - The Florida State women's soccer team amazing postseason run came to an end Friday night as they fell 5-0 against the No. 1 Stanford Cardinal in the fourth round of the 2010 NCAA Tournament. With the loss Florida State (16-6-1) ends their season having made it to the Elite Eight or further for the sixth straight year.

“I think we played an outstanding team today in Stanford,” head coach Mark Krikorian said. “They have an awful lot of outstanding players, and are very well coached. They played beautiful soccer, and I thought that overall, the better team won … I’m proud of our kids that fought and competed and did the best they could on the day.”

The Seminoles kept the game scoreless until the 30th minute when Stanford sophomore Mariah Nogueira struck in a header from a cross from the right by senior All-American Christen Press.

“We knew they were a very good attack-minded team, and we talked about lot of keeping tempo with the game, but we weren’t good enough and they were able to get a hold of it more and get a lot of dangerous crosses in,” added Krikorian.

The Seminoles would continue to fight hard however and entered halftime with Stanford holding a slight 1-0 edge. Stanford would take very little time to strike in the second half, with a goal during the 55th minute by junior forward Lindsey Taylor, her tenth goal of the season. From that point forward Stanford would continue their scoring adding three more goals.

“The quality of their play … their movement off the ball, they have very good players all over of the field,” said Krikorian. “We certainly can look at some of our faults in our defending, but sometimes credit needs to go where it’s due.”

The Seminole defense faced the very difficult task of defending the top team in the country. Led by redshirt freshman keeper Kelsey Wys, the Seminoles had allowed just 15 goals on the entire season, but by allowing a season high 23 shots by the Seminole keeper could only do her best in a difficult situation, finishing the game with 10 saves.

“All the goals they scored were quality goals, and they did well enough to put a bunch of balls to the back of the net,” added Wys.

With the loss, the careers of three seniors, Amanda DaCosta, Janice Cayman and Rachel Lim come to an end. DaCosta finishes her career in the top five all time for Florida State in games played, games started and game winning assists.

“We’ve been through a lot being here,” reflected DaCosta. “Things didn’t go our way, but it’s a great group of girls we have, and I like what [Coach Krikorian] is doing here.”

Florida State’s record is now 30-10-2 all-time in NCAA tournament play. While Florida State has been dominant at home during their postseason history, with a 21-1-0 all-time record, it hasn’t had as much success on the road with a 4-5-1 record away from home.

Despite the loss, the Seminoles put together a remarkable season, especially considering they played all year without Tiffany McCarty and Jessica Price, the top two scorers from last season as both missed the season due to injury.

“We definitely had to overcome a lot, and different players had to step up in their absence,” said DaCosta. “There definitely is a sense of pride [with this team]. We’ve had a lot of curveballs thrown our way, and I’m very proud of our team.”