LAS VEGAS (UNLVRebels.com) - After a three-game road stretch, UNLV women's soccer returned home Sunday afternoon and turned in a dominant 6-0 performance over CSU Bakersfield at Peter Johann Memorial Field. The Rebels' six goals were a season high - with three coming in each half - while true freshman
Emberly Sevilla recorded her first career shutout.
With the victory, UNLV (4-1-1) remained a perfect 3-0 at home on the year and have now won two games in a row thanks to an offense that has scored nine goals in that span. The Roadrunners fell to 1-4 in 2018.
THE TURNING POINT: UNLV's offense came out firing and the aggressiveness paid off early as
Michaela Morris sent a cross to the waiting foot of senior
Amanda Galbraith, who took one touch and then fired a shot past the CSUB keeper in the sixth minute for the 1-0 lead. The Rebels extended their lead to 2-0 on a made penalty kick by junior
Georgia Kingman, then all but put the game away right before the half with sophomore
Erykah Browne getting one in the back of the net after a scrum in front of the box for a 3-0 lead in the 43rd minute.
REBEL OF THE GAME: Hard to choose just one. For the second consecutive game, Galbraith got the team going with an early goal, which proved to be the game winner. Morris assisted on the opening goal and on the fourth goal of the game with a nice give-and-go with senior Cailtyn Kreutz, who scored her third goal of the year in the 65th minute. In addition to the penalty kick, Kingman also assisted on the final two goals of the game, which were scored just over a minute apart by redshirt senior
Kaila Brinkman, who now leads the team with four total in 2018.
STAT OF THE GAME: UNLV had a season-high 32 shots in the game, while they have registered at least 15 shots in five of six games this season. CSUB's five were a season-low allowed by UNLV, with the Rebels holding the Roadrunners to zero shots in the first half.
QUOTABLE: Head coach Chris Shaw:
On the offense scoring nine goals over the last two games -
"We talk about not only creating chances but finishing those chances and both games this weekend we did a much better job at finishing our opportunities in front of the goal. I'm really pleased with our performance."
On the defense clamping down:
"That's been a bigger point of emphasis for us - we're at the top of the conference offensively, but near the bottom defensively and that's not where we want to be. We talked about having more pride in our defending and not giving up goals, so I was pleased with the shutout and our performance on both sides of the ball today."
UP NEXT: The Rebels will have another home and road split, heading to Northern Arizona for a Friday night match in Flagstaff at 7 p.m. PT then returning home Sunday to host Montana at 1 p.m. at Peter Johann Memorial Field.
REBEL NOTES:
* The six goals were the most for UNLV since a 6-0 win over Texas A&M-Corpus Christi on August 21, 2016
* The nine goals in the last two games came after a two-game stretch where the offense was limited to just one goal in a loss and double OT tie in Utah
* This was the first shutout of the season for UNLV, who had four total in 2017
* Galbraith had a monster weekend, scoring two goals and getting the game-winning assist Thursday at CSUN
* Head coach
Chris Shaw needs just one victory to tie the program record for most wins by a head coach. The current record holder is Dan Abdalla who went 54-38-8 from 2000-04
* UNLV is celebrating its 20th season in program history, with the official recognition taking place on Friday, Oct. 5 as the Rebels host Fresno State
