BATON ROUGE — Senior forward Kate Ripple and junior forward Joleen Phillips each scored a goal and freshman goalkeeper Jackie Moseley earned her fourth shutout of the season to lead the LSU soccer team past Mississippi State, 2-0, on Sunday for its first Southeastern Conference win of the season.
The Tigers improve to 5-4-2 overall and 1-2-1 in SEC play, while the Bulldogs fall to 1-7-3 overall and 0-4 in the SEC. LSU is now 8-2-1 all-time versus Mississippi State and has run its unbeaten streak against the Bulldogs to four-straight matches.
“We feel great about the win today,” said LSU head coach Brian Lee. “It was probably our first complete performance for 90 minutes this season. We were organized defensively the whole time, and the back line looked great and limited Mississippi State to very few chances. We also created a lot of chances for ourselves and scored a couple of nice goals.”
LSU missed an opportunity to score its first goal of the match in the 23rd minute of the first half when freshman midfielder Melissa Clarke took a pass from Phillips and ripped a shot into Mississippi State goalkeeper Emily Meyers, who was forced to make a diving save to keep the Tigers out of the net.
However, Phillips put LSU on top in the following minute with a chip shot just inside the left post on a pass from senior midfielder Stacie McDougall. Phillips is currently second on the team with five goals and is tied for the team lead with 12 points on the season.
The Tigers carried their 1-0 lead into the locker room by attempting seven shots, including two shots on goal, and four corner kicks. The Bulldogs were held to just one shot on goal and one corner kick in the first half.
Ripple pushed the Tiger lead to 2-0 by scoring her team-leading sixth goal of the season at the 81:44 mark of the second half on a header off a cross from sophomore midfielder Caroline Vanderpool. Ripple is tied with Phillips with 12 points, and the two have combined to score 11 of 14 goals for the Tigers this season.
“We finally put together the last pass, stepped through and gave ourselves a lot of opportunities on goal,” Lee said. “There were some good chances that we didn’t score on, but it’s more important that we’re creating them. Kate and Joleen scored a couple of nice goals, and both continue to play very well for us.”
Moseley only needed to save two Mississippi State shots to earn her fourth shutout of the season and improve her record to 5-3-2. Moseley is now tied for fourth on the all-time list for shutouts with Allison Holladay and Elizabeth Swinson, who lettered for LSU in 1995 and 1998, respectively.
LSU outshot the Bulldogs in the match 17-10 with seven shots on goal and attempted seven corner kicks to just one for Mississippi State. The Bulldogs committed 15 fouls and the Tigers committed eight, while no cards were awarded in the match.
LSU returns to action next weekend with home matches at the LSU Soccer Complex against the Georgia Bulldogs on Friday at 7 p.m. and the 20th-ranked Tennessee Volunteers on Sunday at 1 p.m.