Women’s soccer opens year with UTRGV tourney win

The women’s soccer team started the year with a bang by winning the UTRGV Tournament and placing five student-athletes on the All-Tournament Team. 

Head Coach Glad Bugariu’s squad won the deciding game 2-1 Sunday over Sam Houston State University, the first time the school has won the UTRGV Tournament. 

“Sunday games are all about who adapts to the conditions faster, who embraces the heat and wind, and we scored two great goals,” Bugariu said. “It was a great effort and the team fought hard. We’re very proud and hopefully this will continue.” 

Junior forward Diandra Aliaga was feeling it offensively, converting on two of her eight shots. Her two goals matched her single-game record, which she set a year ago against Fairleigh Dickinson University.  

Her first goal came at the 3:53 mark, when senior Hanna Spets connected with freshman Gina Steiner, who then found a ready-to-strike Aliaga. The second goal came after junior Malia Irvine passed ahead to sophomore Sarah Bonney who found Aliaga in perfect scoring position with a pinpoint cross. 

“It was really fun; I felt like on Friday I was kind of tense, the crowd was pretty big and today I just had fun,” Aliaga said. “We dominate because of the heat and other people can’t handle that. Today, I feel like we played much better and this is our first chance to be tournament champions and we knew the heat was our teammate, so we just went out and killed it.” 

The action began Friday night as UTRGV poured it on Prairie View A&M University, recording 19 shots that resulted in a 3-1 victory.  

Senior Andreya Barrera kicked the scoring off in the first half by drawing the goalie out of her box and finding an empty net; then, freshman Anna Hover, a McAllen native, scored the second goal on an assist from sophomore Mackenzie McLeod.  

UTRGV’s third goal came off a corner kick by Hover, which junior Tuva Rolstad Nilsen sent in for a score. UTRGV outshot Prairie View A&M 19-6 in the match.  

The five student-athletes named to the All-Tournament Team were senior Marcela Ramirez, Spets, Aliaga, Nilsen and Steiner. 

“We’re always looking for good performances and winning individual battles, which we did today,” Spets, a team captain, said. “We’re going to keep on working extremely hard over this upcoming week and prepare for Corpus Christi.” 

The UTRGV women’s soccer team will be in action again 7 p.m. Sunday as it hosts Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi in the first matchup of the South Texas Showdown at the UTRGV Soccer and Track & Field Complex.