Dominance has been all that No. 6 TCU soccer has known as of late, and the Frogs kept the ball rolling with an impressive 6-0 home victory over the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley at home on Sunday.
Even following an hour-and-a-half rain delay at halftime, TCU controlled the game from start to finish, outshooting UTRGV 34-2 in the match.
Five different players scored for the Horned Frogs in a game where head coach Eric Bell played 24 different players.
“We are pretty deep,” Bell said. “We knew going into the season that playing time was gonna be at a premium and we were able to showcase a lot of different players in a lot of different positions.”
The Horned Frogs dominated the game almost out of the gate. Within the first minute, UTRGV had the first shot of the game, but TCU would then keep possession of the ball for 70% of the time throughout the 90 minutes.
Junior Grace Collins would open the scoring for the Frogs with a great individual action. She dribbled to the baseline inside the box and, with almost no angle, found the net with a shot to the near post.
Collins became a protagonist for TCU again 17 minutes in, crossing a ball from the right wing to find junior Gracie Brian inside the 6-yard box for a header that would double the lead for TCU.
Both teams would lock up defensively for the rest of the half, with the Frogs carrying their 2-0 lead through the rest of the first half and the halftime rain delay.
The dormant time was not an issue for TCU, scoring four times in the second half.
“I was kind of worried, obviously, coming in with a big, long break like that, but I thought our second half was better than our first half,” Bell said.
Five minutes into the second half, senior Messiah Bright cut inside from the left side barely inside the box and, with a strong right-footed shot to the near post, scored her second goal of the season.
With 30 minutes left, first-year Oli Peña found the top right corner of the net with a strike from about 25 yards out to score her first college career goal.
Ten minutes later, fellow first-year Camryn Lancaster, who had already created a couple of chances, took on her defender and crossed the ball over the defense for Brian to tap in her second goal of the afternoon.
At the 80-minute mark, Lancaster provided her second assist of the day by swinging in a corner to the penalty spot for a header from first-year Lauren Memoly. Like Pena, the score was Memoly’s first career goal at the collegiate level.
The win moves TCU to 3-0 on the season, as the Frogs try and build off their 2020 appearance in the NCAA Elite 8.
The Horned Frogs will finish their three-game homestand by hosting the University of Colorado at Boulder on Thursday. Kickoff is set for 7 pm, and the game will be streamed on ESPN+.
