Bears battle Southern Utah to a 1-1 2OT tie

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OREM, Utah – The Northern Colorado women's soccer team fought back from an early deficit to earn a 1-1 double-overtime tie against the Thunderbirds of Southern Utah on Friday afternoon.

The game, played on the campus of Utah Valley University, looked like it would perhaps be an offensive showdown after Southern Utah got on the board in just the 3rd minute. The Thunderbirds got the game's opening goal after Stacey Brinkman scored on an unassisted goal that ricocheted off the post and past Bears' goalkeeper Kirstin Salminen.

From there, the game settled down and the Thunderbirds went into halftime with the lead. But eight minutes into the second half, Danielle Birdsall found the equalizer off of a Kimmie Feidler assist. Birdsall notched her fourth goal of the season after receiving a cross from Feidler and striking it into the corner of the net.

"I thought today was just one of those games where we got caught early with that goal and had to kind of chase the game," said Northern Colorado head coach Tim Barrera. "We battled back to tie and we had some good opportunities to go ahead, we just couldn't put any away."

The Bears did indeed seem to have more scoring opportunities throughout the game than Southern Utah, getting ten shots on goal compared to five for the Thunderbirds. In the first half, Northern Colorado had seven shots on goal but could not put one past goalkeeper Charly Booth.

After allowing the very early goal, Salminen was solid for the Bears, locking down the Thunderbirds and making five saves to keep Northern Colorado in the match.

The Bears will try to recover from their first overtime game of the year and prepare to take on the Wolverines of Utah Valley on Sunday afternoon.