Rockets fall to Wisconsin, 5-0, in first round of NCAA Championship

November 11, 2017 | Athletics, News
By Stewart Sabine



The Toledo women’s soccer team was defeated by Wisconsin, 5-0, as the Wisconsin Badgers scored five second-half goals to eliminate the Rockets from the NCAA Championship on a cold Friday night at the McClimon Soccer Complex in Madison.

The Rockets (12-8-3) fought off a strong first-half attack from Wisconsin as redshirt freshman goalkeeper Madison Perrin made five saves on 13 Badger shots in the opening period.

Wisconsin (14-5-2) scored its first goal of the match in the 55th minute when Grace Douglas found the back of the net for the first time in her career.

Douglas scored again in the 59th minute to make the score 2-0 in favor of the Badgers. Wisconsin went on to score in the 61st minute and the 65th minute to make it four goals in the span of 10 minutes. UW added a tally in the 74th minute to reach the final score of 5-0.

“Give credit to Wisconsin. They are a heck of a team,” said Toledo Head Coach TJ Buchholz. “They made some great plays. Scoring their first goal really took a lot of wind out of our sails.

“We expected the outcome to be closer, but it’s never easy to go on the road and get a result. It was even at half, and then they made a couple of plays that took us out of what we wanted to do.”

Toledo was out-shot 24-5 and did not take a corner kick in the contest. Senior forward Sophie Pohl led the Rockets with two attempts, one of which was on target. Perrin ended the night with seven saves for the Midnight Blue and Gold.

The Rockets’ NCAA Championship record falls to 0-5-0 in program history, while Wisconsin improves to 16-18-2.

“The loss hurts, but we are still Mid-American Conference Champs,” Buchholz said. “We still have that trophy and still have a season to be proud of. We’re going to keep our head high and not let this loss get us down.”

Toledo’s season ends after its fifth MAC Tournament Championship and its fifth trip to the national tournament. Wisconsin will move on to the second round of the NCAA Championship to face the winner of Alabama State and South Carolina.

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