The University of Mississippi Athletics
Three Rebels Net First Goals of the Season
9/14/2014 | Soccer, Blog
Leading 1-0 after controlling the play for much of the game, Ole Miss opened up a 3-0 lead on Middle Tennessee with a pair of goals in the final minute of the first half on the way to a 4-0 win Sunday.
After scoring the first goal of the match, sophomore Addie Forbus broke free, looking for her second goal. Her initial shot was blocked by the MTSU keeper but sophomore Georgia Russell controlled the rebound and scored inside the far post.
"Addie was 1-v-1 with the goalkeeper, and she really made it happen," Russell said. "I followed through and there was nobody out there besides me and Addie, so I took a shot, and luckily it went in."
"She smacked that ball on a dime," Forbus said. "She put it right in the far post. It was perfect. It was a great goal."
For Russell, it was a long, winding road to her first career goal after suffering an injury in the preseason two years ago and then suffering another season-ending injury last October.
"It was a struggle," Russell said. "I had to get back in shape and get my touch back on the ball. I hurt my ankle last season. It's been a struggle and I'm getting there. It looks like things are coming together. I'm 100 percent healthy, and I want to keep it that way."
Seconds later, after a scramble in the box, sophomore Sara Coleman came up with the loose ball off a deflection and passed it to junior Jennifer Miller, who scored with two seconds left on the clock for her first goal of the season.
"We tell to our team that it's a 90-minutes game, and each half is 45 minutes, so play it to end," head coach Matt Mott said. "I really like our fitness level. We are a fit team, and when you're fit like that, you can handle the end of halves. And I also like our rotation, both up front and in the midfield, getting a lot of guys some minutes, which are getting them ready to play and also helps with the fitness level late in halves."
In the second half, sophomore Gretchen Harknett added to the scoring and joined Russell and Miller in scoring her first goal of the season, as she converted a penalty kick after Coleman was taken down in the box.
"It was really big for Gretchen Harknett," Mott said. "She's played really well all nonconference, and for her to get on the board was big for her because she's had a couple of really good looks. If she starts scoring, we're going to be really dangerous and she's right there."
"A lot of people thought without the big-star names that we weren't able to put any goals in, but we have shown that we still have a great offense and attack, and we're really dangerous when we get the ball in dangerous areas," Forbus said.
With Sunday's win, Ole Miss improves to 5-1-2 on the season, and despite the six goals on the weekend, Mott looks for the team to improves its finishing ahead of a two-match road swing at Mississippi State on Friday and Central Florida in its final nonconference match on Sunday.
"We have to spend some time in practice on finishing for sure," Mott said. "We're doing a good job of creating chance and now we have to find the back of net. It's obviously really hard to do. On Friday night down at Austin Peay, we had a number of chances too that we just weren't clean enough up in front of goal, so it has to be a focus for us this week certainly, and we'll do that. And hopefully clean it up for Friday."
