Freshman Skylar Heinrich scored her eighth goal of the season in the first half and senior Kylin Grubb notched her second of the year in the second half to provide all the offensive punch Creighton would need to earn a 2-0 win over DePaul on Saturday afternoon at Morrison Stadium.
Redshirt sophomore goalkeeper Katie Sullivan made seven saves to anchor a back line that had to turn away 20 shots from the Blue Demons in order to post its third clean sheet of the season.
“Any time you go into halftime with a lead you know the other team is going to start coming at you,” Creighton head coach Ross Paule said. “We need to do a better job of staying composed once we win the ball, but I couldn’t be more proud of the grit of our back line. Players were throwing their body in front of the ball, and Katie made great decisions coming out clean with the ball.”
DePaul put a lot of pressure on Creighton’s defense in the second half in an effort to find the equalizer after an opening 45 minutes that were mostly dictated by the play of CU’s Energizer Bunny, Skylar Heinrich.
The budding superstar gave the Bluejays a 1-0 lead in the 22nd minute when she split DePaul’s center backs to create a 1v1 with goalkeeper Mollie Eriksson. Heinrich actually got de-possessed on her second touch inside the box, but she stayed with the play, back-tracked to regain possession, and found enough space to slot a ball through three defenders for the go-ahead goal.
“She is just one of those player who never takes off,” Paule said of the freshman from Omaha. “She is always looking for a way to score a goal. Some of them are beautiful, some of them are hard-working goals. It was a great ball through and the keeper made a great save. I think [Skylar] did the right thing on the 1v1 in trying to get around her. The keeper made a great save, but she stayed in tune, went back and had composure to put it in the corner.”
Not only was that Heinrich’s eighth goal of the season, but it was also her eighth at Morrison Stadium, tying her with former Bluejay Lauren Sullivan for the second-most goals scored in a single season at the 16-year-old facility.
More importantly, she set the tone for the Bluejays and helped them put DePaul on their heels for most of the first half after a slow start to the match.
“She changed the match in the first half just by being a little bit more dynamic,” Paule said. “Making them face backwards was what we wanted to do. They are a good team when they are facing forward and staying organized, so we wanted to put the ball in behind them and make them a little uncomfortable, and Skylar’s the player to do that. She not only got in behind them, but [she made them uncomfortable] with her first pressure, her high press.”
DePaul had more urgency in the second half, out-shooting Creighton 13-7 in the period. But the defense held up under the relentless pressure until someone found the opportunity to put away the match.
That someone was Kylin Grubb, and that opportunity came in the 78th minute when freshman defender Gabby Grimaldi settled a clearance by DePaul near midfield and played it over the top of the Blue Demon back line.
Everything that happened after that can best be described as “slow-developing.”
“I really didn’t want the keeper to get it back in her hands and put our defense back under pressure,” Grubb said. “I saw it come off of Skylar and I just took off running and found myself one on one in the box. I kind of froze up a bit — I kind of stood there and cut the defender, and then it was me and the keeper in a stare down. I was like ‘well, what are you gonna do?’ and she was like, ‘well, what are you gonna go?’ and then I felt like it had been 30 seconds so I should probably shoot it because someone is about to come take the ball.”
Grubb said some of her teammates told her afterwards that it looked like she wasn’t even moving, but none of them could complain too much as the end result was a momentum-shifting goal that sealed the deal for the Creighton earn three points toward the pursuit of their first appearance in the Big East Tournament.
The Bluejays improved to 7-3-0 on the season, and earned another quality win on a resume that already had a handful coming in, but the only accomplishment that mattered to Ross Paule at the end of the day was the 1-0-0 mark in Big East play and the next match on the schedule.
“We know there is a lot of work to do,” he said. “We’re just going to enjoy this win and take it game by game. We know we have tough road games coming up, and more tough games coming here, but we’re focused on what’s next and that’s Thursday at Xavier.”