The Queens of College Soccer Have Been Crowned
Santa Clara women’s soccer pulls off a major upset to win National Championship
The Santa Clara Broncos woke up Tuesday morning as national champions.
A thrilling title game nearly 18 months in the making saw the Broncos overtake Florida State University (FSU) with a final score of 4-1 in penalty kicks (PK) after a 1-1 tie and two scoreless overtimes. It became Santa Clara’s second National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Championship––their first since 2001.
“This is the moment we’ve been waiting for. It feels so surreal,” said senior forward Kelsey Turnbow, who scored the equalizer for Santa Clara in the 84th minute. “We’ve been through so many challenges, with this COVID bubble, this past year. And so the hard work, sweat, tears and determination that our team has put in is finally paying off. It feels so great to be a champion.”
Ultimately, it was the same lethal offense that has produced all year––led by Kelsey Turnbow, Izzy D’Aquila, Julie Doyle and Sally Menti—that successfully converted all four PK attempts. Despite FSU’s historic brilliance in shootouts, the Seminoles were unable to convert on Monday night. The Seminoles saw their first two shots clank off Santa Clara goalie Marlee Nicolos’ best friend, the right goalpost, and only converted on their third shot.
“We’ve been practicing our PKs for over a year and a half,” Turnbow said with a laugh. “Our mentality in that moment was to treat [the penalty shots] just like practice.”
Rightfully so, the Seminoles entered the NCAA as the No. 1 seed. FSU and Head Coach Mark Krikorian finished the season without a loss, going 13-0-2 and a perfect 8-0 in a very tough Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC). They entered Monday’s match with 66-17-5 all-time record in the Tournament, good for a .778 winning percentage. It marks the second-best Tournament winning percentage of all-time, trailing only North Carolina with .878.
The first half of the match featured a light drizzle as both teams fought hard for every inch, yet FSU dominated possession. The game was scoreless after the first 45 minutes of play. With the Seminoles controlling the ball 71% of the time, Bronco fans felt fortunate to have a tied game going into halftime.
In the 63rd minute, Florida State freshman Jenna Nighswonger struck first with a left-footed goal that curved from the outside and caromed off the post.
Twenty-one minutes and a costly Seminole mistake later, Turnbow gave Santa Clara some life. She put pressure on FSU’s center back who lost possession. Just inside the 18-yard box, Turnbow danced around two defenders, forcing one to slip on her right foot, and nailed a left-footed shot past FSU’s goalkeeper. A stampede of Broncos came to meet her in the middle of the field and celebrated the game-tying shot.
“[Kelsey] is just a nightmare to handle,” said Santa Clara’s head coach Jerry Smith. “When you have lethal attacking players like we have… we don’t need a lot of chances to score goals. Thankfully, Kelsey put one in for us.”
Florida State and Santa Clara ranked No. 5 and No. 7 in the country for most goals per game this season, but neither team got many chances to score on Monday night. By the end of the second half, each team had only five shots total with the game tied at 1-1.
Both teams were held scoreless in 20 minutes of sudden-death soccer, meaning the national champion would be crowned after a shootout.
After beating Duke and Virginia in PKs the previous two Tournament games, the Seminoles were seemingly in a comfortable position to do so again, but the Broncos had different ideas. They punched four perfect PKs into the back of the net to send the entire team into a celebratory frenzy.
To beat any team in a shootout is a remarkable feat, but to do so against FSU is an entirely different story. The Seminoles entered Monday’s game with seven consecutive PK victories throughout the last decade in both the ACC and NCAA Tournaments.
Their road to the College Cup this season featured two shootouts in the semifinals and quarterfinals, both of which saw perfect penalty kicks from the Seminoles’ attackers.
Florida State vs. Santa Clara Game Notes
“Make no mistake about it, we didn’t not succeed here today because of penalties,” Coach Krikorian said. “Throughout the course of the game we had other opportunities to score a second goal and maybe ease the burden. But we weren’t quite lethal enough. Had we been able to keep composure and score that second goal, maybe we are not sitting here and talking about penalty kicks.”
To win the College Cup, the Broncos slayed the ACC’s powerhouses while beating the two most successful programs in NCAA history. Santa Clara became just the seventh to win numerous national titles, joining North Carolina (21), Notre Dame (3), Stanford (3), Southern California (2), Portland (2) and Florida State (2).
Although Santa Clara’s victory can be defined with clutch moments and powerful offense, they did not do it alone. A handful of Santa Clara fans flocked to North Carolina to witness the Broncos clinch a national title, including Brandi Chastain, Aly Wagner and other players from the 2001 championship squad.
When asked about the crowd’s energy during the game, senior center back Alex Loera expressed tremendous gratitude.
“It truly felt like a home game,” she said. “We couldn’t have done it without the support of our Bronco family.”