Stanford women advance to College Cup with overtime win over Nebraska

STANFORD — Giving up the tying goal with three minutes left in the second half of an NCAA quarterfinal may have deflated some teams. But it seemed only to inspire the second-seeded Stanford women’s soccer team.

The Cardinal scored four minutes into overtime to beat No. 5 Nebraska 2-1 on Friday at Cagan Stadium and advance to their first College Cup since 2019.

“I was proud of the character because to concede with three minutes left before you go to the College Cup, that’s kind of devastating,” Stanford coach Paul Ratcliffe said. “They dealt with it well and they kept fighting and they got a great goal to win the game.”

Nebraska (17-4-3) ended Stanford’s streak of 470 minutes without allowing a goal when it tied the game with 3:01 remaining in regulation. Goalkeeper Ryan Campbell came out to contest a long pass into the box, but Cornhuskers forward Sarah Weber got to the ball first and headed it into the net.

“Obviously wasn’t the most ideal situation, but we knew that we had the resilience, we had the fight, we had the grit to keep going,” defender Kennedy Wesley said. “That definitely wasn’t going to define our season. We weren’t going to let it end that way.”

It was only the 10th goal Stanford (19-0-4) had allowed all season, but the Cardinal needed just seven minutes of game time to respond. Allie Montoyo’s near-post cross was backheeled by Pac-12 Midfielder of the Year Jasmine Aikey into the path of Maya Doms, who tapped the ball into the open net with 5:49 remaining in the first overtime.

It was the fourth goal in the last six matches for Doms, a fifth-year midfielder from Davis.

“I thought we dominated the whole game and it was unfortunate to get scored on in the last five minutes,” Doms said. “But we knew we weren’t going to end our season on our home field.”

The Cardinal are unbeaten in 29 straight home games and haven’t lost in 35 matches overall.

Stanford will now face No. 1 BYU n the College Cup next Friday in Cary, N.C. BYU defeated No. 3 North Carolina 4-3 late Friday night.

The quarterfinal provided an intriguing matchup between Stanford, which has allowed 0.42 goals a game, and Nebraska, which scored 11 times in the first three rounds of the NCAA Tournament.

The Cardinal contained Eleanor Dale, who leads the country in goals (28) and shots per game (6.0) but was held to three shots Friday by a defense that focused on denying her the ball.

Stanford got the early lead on an own goal in the 11th minute. Montoya’s cross was headed back across the Nebraska box by Andrea Kithata. Joelle Jung, a freshman from Lynbrook High in San Jose, poked the ball toward the goal, and it was kicked in by a Cornhuskers defender.

Despite playing with the lead, Stanford controlled play and allowed only one shot on goal until Nebraska’s equalizer.

“Everyone’s playing like it’s their last game, so things like that are bound to happen, but we’re lucky enough that we have the personnel to know how to respond,” Wesley said.