Brady's Second-Half Strike Springs Merrimack Over Bentley, 1-0
NORTH ANDOVER, Mass. – With both teams scoreless early in the second half, junior forward Sami Brady (Rockland, Mass.) tallied her second goal of the season to lift the Merrimack women's soccer team to a 1-0 blanking against conference rival Bentley in a Northeast-10 Conference showdown on Wednesday night at Martone-Mejail Field.
Unbeaten in their last three matches, the Warriors eclipse the double-digit win mark and improve to 10-6-1 on the year with an 8-5-1 mark in league play. With the victory, the Warriors have officially clinched a playoff spot in the NE-10 Tournament next week, and can still move up in the standings with one last match to go. The Falcons, meanwhile, fall to 5-8-3 and 3-8-3 inside the conference.
Also with the win, Merrimack clinched a spot in the NE-10 Tournament for the 28th consecutive season, and also established an NCAA record by clinching a winning season for the 29th straight year.
Brady's goal was the only score of the game for either side, as the junior took a long pass from sophomore Sarah Coakley (Medway, Mass.) and embarked on a foot race down the right flank. After positioning herself just inside the box on the right-wing side, Brady unloaded a low shot that Bentley goalkeeper Christiana Hynds got a piece of, but could only watch as the loose ball trickled through her legs and into the open net for the deciding strike.
The goal was Brady's second of the season – as well as her first game-winner – while Coakley notched her fourth helper of the year in the process.
Hynds finished with a game-high 10 saves for the visitors in a match that saw numerous shot attempts and 20 combined shots on goal, while junior Nicole Curtis (Billerica, Mass.) stopped nine attempts for the Warriors.
Merrimack doubled Bentley's shot attempts in the first half (10-5) before dominating a second half that saw them outshoot the visitors by a 17-8 margin, amounting in a 27-13 total advantage in shot attempts in the game.
Still, the Falcons put nine shots on target and nearly tied the match up on a header attempt on a corner by Sydney Spiegel, but the attempt rang off the crossbar and was cleared by the defense.
In total, the Warriors held a 5-3 edge in corner kicks while both teams combined for 25 fouls.
Next up, the Warriors wrap up the regular season with a road match at league foe Assumption on Saturday, Oct. 27. First whistle is set for 7 p.m.
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