Every team across the country goes to bed on the eve of their first match dreaming of what they hope to accomplish in the months ahead. For Creighton, those ambitions turned into a waking nightmare on Friday night during the first 10 minutes of their 2019 season-opener against Kansas State.
Senior forward Katie Cramer stunned a Morrison Stadium crowd of more than 2,000 people with goals in the 4th minute and 11th minute of the match to give the Wildcats a 2-0 lead without hardly breaking a sweat, but CU senior midfielder Taryn Jakubowksi’s penalty kick just before the end of the first half gave the Bluejays momentum that they carried over into the second half to blitz their way to a 3-2 come-from-behind win.
“We knew it was going to be hectic in the beginning,” Jakubowski said. “Obviously we didn’t think we were going to go down 2-0, but that was kind of our wake-up call. We’ve struggled in the past of going down early and not being able to come back, and I think this shows the heart and the talent we have now to be able to get that goal back and score two more and keep that lead. It’s a big turnaround for us, and it’s really special and something that’s nice to see.”
Neither of the two early goals Creighton allowed were ones head coach Ross Paule feels his team should be content to live with. A moment of indecisiveness on the part of sophomore goalkeeper Katie Sullivan led to the first score as she was late off her line on a ball over the top. That allowed Cramer to get her head to it and send it bouncing harmlessly over the end line to put the Wildcats ahead 1-0 just 3:27 into the match.
The second strike came with 10:06 ticked off the game clock when Cramer got to the end of a ball served in by junior midfielder Brookelynn Entz and drilled it into the upper right corner of the net.
“They were soft goals,” Paule said. “They are goals that shouldn’t really happen. Hopefully it’s just a beginning of season miscommunication from goalkeeper to back line. Those things happen at the highest level also, but honestly, it shouldn’t happen. We are going to watch film and we are going to learn from it, because we can’t give away goals like that.”
Before Creighton could get any rhythm offensively they had to put the fire defensively to play their way into the match.
Enter Jaylin Bosak.
The senior center back didn’t not draw the starting assignment on Friday after being banged up in practice throughout the week, but she sure delivered when Paule called her number in the 23rd minute. Despite not operating at 100%, she snuffed out several potentially dangerous chances and slowed Kansas State’s momentum to keep them from building on the early lead and possibly putting the match on ice before halftime.
“[Bosak] always been our rock back there,” Jakubowski said. “Having her provides so much security. You just know what you’re going to get from her — you’re going to get the fight and the heart. Her capabilities back there are just tremendous. With her back there you don’t have to worry as much about defending. She changed the game.”
With the back line solidified Creighton started to seize control and loosen up enough to create some opportunities in the attacking third as the first half wound down. Jakubowski diced her way through not one, not two, but three Kansas State defenders to create a scoring chance in the 44th minute, then beat two more Wildcats to get inside the 18-yard box and draw a foul to earn a crucial penalty kick with 58 seconds left in the opening period.
The First Team All-Big East midfielder lined up her shot, calmly approached the marker, waited for the goalkeeper to maker her move, then effortlessly tapped the ball into the lower right corner to trim the deficit in half just before the break.
“Like I said before the season — we expect [Taryn] to change games,” Paule said. “She can change games through effort and she can change games through finding those holes to beat players. She has great vision on the ball and she can finish. She’s really developed and it’s fun to watch, because the team feeds off of it.”
There was little doubt that Jakubowski’s penalty kick gave the Bluejays a massive shot in the arm as it took them just 3:25 into the second half to find the equalizer. Senior forward Cassie Legband took an aggressive touch toward the end line along the right side of the box and played a picture-perfect ball to the far post where budding superstar freshman Skylar Heinrich was there to blast a one-timer through the back of the net to tie the match at 2-2 with her first career goal as a D1 soccer player.
The eventual game-winner came in the 63rd minute when sophomore left back Ansley Atkinson served a ball deep into the box from the 35 yards out right to the left foot of junior forward Juelle Love, who flicked it back to senior forward Kylin Grubb. Grubb fired a shot on frame that was kick-saved by Kansas State goalkeeper Rachel Harris, but the carom found the left foot of junior midfielder Keelie Fothergill, who didn’t even wait for it to land before lacing a shot off Harris’ gloves for a third unanswered goal to put the Bluejays in front for good.
From Jaylin Bosak locking down K-State’s attack to all of the individual brilliance in the attack third that drew “oohs” and “aahs” from the 2,023 fans in the stands — the second-largest crowd in the history of Creighton women’s soccer — everything over the last 80-ish minutes on the pitch on Friday night was a glimpse of what Ross Paule envisioned when he returned to Omaha in 2015 to lead the women’s soccer program.
Even throughout the all of the tense moments of erasing a 2-0 deficit to protecting a 3-2 lead, the Creighton Hall of Famer couldn’t help but enjoy himself on the sideline as he watched his players energize the near-record crowd and feed off of the emotion they engineered.
“It is fun when you see players taking players one on one, and having that creativity and the freedom to do that in the attack and pulling it off,” Paule said. “We had a great crowd tonight and it was huge for us. It was a huge part of us being able to pull back and keep that momentum. Any time you feel the crowd on your back and you know that next goal could be coming it just builds that excitement onto the field for the players. It’s such a joy — we have a beautiful stadium and now we’re playing beautiful football. Today was a great day for Creighton soccer.”
Creighton will now take their 1-0-0 record and pick apart all of the good, the bad, and the ugly that came from the season-opening win into film and training before they return to the pitch on Thursday, August 29 when South Dakota State comes to town for a 7:00 p.m. match at Morrison Stadium.
