LACEY, Wash. – Taking care of its scoring early on in Thursday's Great Northwest Athletic Conference women's soccer match, host Saint Martin's University defeated Montana State University Billings 2-0 amid a downpour at Saints Field.
 
The Saints (3-4, 2-1 GNAC) scored twice in the opening 17 minutes of the match, and collected their third shutout victory of the 2021 season. On a day that featured constant, heavy rain on the Saints' grass playing surface, MSUB slipped to 4-3-1 overall and 1-2 in conference play after Thursday's defeat. "We started the game poorly and slowly, and we didn't recover," said MSUB head coach Stephen Cavallo. "We conceded two early goals, and at that point we were trying to play catch up the rest of the game."
 
The Saints used the slick conditions to their advantage in the opening five minutes, when a cross by Rebecca Garrison skidded through the goal box and found Maddie Wolff at the far post. The forward was able to tuck a soft shot with her right foot inside the left goal post, giving SMU the early 1-0 advantage.
 
SMU doubled its tally in the 17th minute when Garrison got goal-side position on her defender and pounced on a cross into the six-yard box from Payton Aselton.
 
MSUB's Leila Clark had a promising, long strike three minutes later, but her attempt from the top of the box on the left side carried just wide of the opposite upper-corner of the goal. Senior Lexie Bloyder had the Yellowjackets' best look of the opening half, rolling a left-footed shot just wide of the far post from the top of the box with 16 minutes left before the break.
 
Clare Keenan had an incredible, leaping save on a dangerous free kick with one minute left in the half, helping keep the deficit manageable. Aselton drilled a shot towards the upper-right corner of the net, and the Yellowjacket keeper laid out to tip the ball wide of the net at the last second.
 
Vendela Andersson recovered well 10 minutes into the second half, sliding to knock away a shot attempt from point-blank range that would have proven difficult for Keenan to react to.
 
A shot by Sydney Torres with 10 minutes to play required a diving stop from Ali Campigotto, but the Saint goalkeeper comfortably handled the on-target effort to keep the shutout intact. MSUB's final look towards goal came with three minutes to go, when Liberty Palmer and Jordan Roe combined on a give-and-go inside the box. Palmer put a left-footed strike on target, but Campigotto slid to guard her near post and gobble up the attempt.
 
Keenan added another solid stop with six minutes left in the match, elevating to her right to push away a long free-kick strike by Aselton that was destined for the back of the net. Aselton led all players with four shots in the match, and placed a pair of them on frame.
 
Palmer, who entered the day as the GNAC's leader in shots on goal, had MSUB's lone on-target strike of the match giving her 15 shots on frame among her 22 attempts this fall. Keenan did all she could with six saves in the match, while Bloyder played the full 90 minutes, Andersson contributed 72, and Hailee Gertsch turned in 68 on the back line.
 
"These were incredibly difficult conditions to play in, however there was one team that battled through that and it was Saint Martin's," Cavallo said on the sopping wet pitch. "As we started to play better we tried to create more, but we weren't able to get anything serious on goal. We really want to see the team recover well from this, because we are going to be in a dog fight against Western Oregon on Saturday."
 
THE BUZZ: Kendall McGraw contributed a season-high 57 minutes off the bench and was named the St. Vincent Healthcare Player of the Game…senior captain Haylee Gunter played for the first time since the season opener on Sept. 2, missing the previous six games with an injury…MSUB is now 13-10-2 all-time against SMU and is 7-4-2 in matches played in Washington.
 
NEXT UP: The road trip continues on Saturday when the Yellowjackets take on Western Oregon University with an 11 a.m. Pacific/noon Mountain kickoff in Monmouth, Ore. Live video will be available online here and live statistics will be available online here.