Oct. 15, 2006
BERKELEY, Calif. - On the strength of the team's sixth shut out of the season and a penalty kick goal scored by Kyleyn Felts with 10 seconds remaining in the first half of play, the Arizona State University soccer team upset No. 12 California, 1-0, Sunday afternoon in Berkeley, Calif. The victory, which snapped a three-match slide, improved the Sun Devils' record to 6-6-2 overall and 1-3-0 in the Pac-10 while dropping the Golden Bears to 7-3-4 overall and 0-2-2 in the league.
"Today was an incredible team performance all around," Head Coach Ray Leone said. "We played a lot of players today and every one of them played as hard a possible. Kim Bingham played an unbelievable match and helped us break through to pick up a great result. We fought hard in both matches this weekend, the first time we have done that in the last 10 matches, and I am happy for these players to pick up a hard-fought victory, especially on the road against a very good Pac-10 team."
The first half of play was even between both squads as each recorded four shots and committed four fouls in the first 45 minutes. But, with the intermission approaching, the Sun Devils earned a chance to make sure the score was not even at the break as freshman Lindsey Johns carried the ball into the Cal box where she was taken down and awarded a penalty shot. Felts, a junior, stepped up to the spot and put the ball into the back of the net for what would later stand as the game-winning goal.
Felts' goal marked two firsts in her career as she recorded the first goal and the first points in her nearly three years of play for the Sun Devils. Her penalty kick goal also marked the first PK attempt of the year for ASU and the first since Brittany Cooper scored on the only attempt of the 2005 season in a 3-1 defeat of Syracuse.
The second half saw the Golden Bears go on the attack, outshooting the visitors 7-3 in the stanza. Despite the advantage in attempts, senior keeper Kim Bingham was up to the task as she tallied four of her six saves in the second half to record her sixth shut out of the year, the second-most in a single season in ASU history. For her career, Bingham now has 15.5 shut outs, the second-most in a career at ASU.
ASU returns to Tempe for its final three home matches of the season with two coming next weekend. The Sun Devils open the weekend with USC at 7 p.m. Friday before closing out the weekend with No. 4 UCLA at 1 p.m. Sunday.