Virginia women’s soccer capped off its non-conference schedule with a resounding win over Howard at Klöckner Stadium Sunday afternoon. Once again, the Cavaliers (7-0-0, 0-0-0 ACC) faced little resistance on either side of the ball, recording goals from four different players while holding the Bison (1-3-3, 0-0-0 NEC) to zero shots.
Virginia peppered Howard’s net early, tallying 10 shots on goal in the first half alone. Sophomore goalkeeper Trinity Knox held strong for Howard with a handful of tough saves.
The Cavaliers, however, broke the seal on the scoring in the 20th minute when senior defender Samar Guidry took the rebound of sophomore forward Allie Ross’s shot and drilled the point-blank opportunity into the back of the net. This was Guidry’s first collegiate goal since her 2021 sophomore season.
“It’s been a minute since I had a goal, so I am always trying to get up in the attacking third,” Guidry said.
The Virginia attack struck again when freshman forward Sophia Bradley crossed the ball in from the right corner for the oncoming sophomore midfielder Ella Carter, who asserted herself between two Bison defenders to knock in the Cavaliers’ second score of the game in the 55th minute. The tap-in goal for Carter was her second of the season and gave Bradley her first career assist.
Junior forward Maggie Cagle just missed an opportunity to continue her goal-scoring tear when her shot in the 60th minute was turned away by the crossbar. Cagle, Virginia’s leading scorer, came off the bench for the first time this season after starting each of the first six games.
“Maggie was a little under the weather,” Coach Steve Swanson said. “She didn’t train yesterday, so we were trying to be careful with her.”
The barrage of goals continued in the 73rd minute by senior defender Kiki Maki off of a Cavalier corner kick that entered into the goal box. Knox, who faced relentless pressure all game, was unable to get two hands on the ball, allowing Maki to control the weak deflection and add a second insurance goal to Virginia’s lead. Maki, who entered the season goalless in her career, has now scored twice in three games.
The scoring parade was capped off by a Ross penalty kick in the 85th minute. The sophomore forward drew the foul on junior defender Laila Cowsette in the box. Ross’s goal put an exclamation point on the Virginia victory as well as on a productive individual performance of a goal and assist.
In addition to Cagle coming off of the bench, Virginia shook up the starting lineup with senior goalkeeper Camryn Miller in the net against Howard, giving Miller her first collegiate start.
“Cam Miller has been very good all year since January, and we just thought overall that she deserved to start,” Swanson said. “When called upon she did well, her distribution was very good.”
In addition to goal support from the offense, Miller had a lot of help from her defense to keep the goal clean, as the Bison were unable to record a single shot. With this performance, the Cavaliers have not allowed a shot on goal in their past four matches.
“Throughout all of our out-of-conference games we have been very structured and disciplined,” Maki said.
The win over the Bison serves as a bookend to an impressive month of non-conference competition for the Cavaliers. Despite their dominance against Howard, Swanson feels his team still has areas to improve upon.
”I thought our performance was erratic. We got the result today, but we all talked about it after the game, and we could have raised our level a whole lot,” Swanson said. “We didn’t move the ball as sharply or crisply as we usually do, we didn’t penetrate as much as I would like to see.”
Despite the criticism, Swanson was just as quick to praise the depth of his squad, perhaps a reason why he holds his squad to such a high standard.
“We’ve got more than 11 starters I feel,” Swanson said. “It’s important to keep everybody sharp and everybody ready.”
Virginia will enter conference play as one of three big teams to beat, alongside No. 2 North Carolina and No. 3 Florida State. The Cavaliers are sure to be more challenged in a very talented ACC, but their elite early season play reflects Virginia’s preparedness for the season and potential to dominate teams when executing their gameplan. The Cavaliers will kick off their ACC campaign on the road against Miami Thursday at 7 p.m., and the game will be broadcast on ACCN.
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