Lindenmuth Leads Badgers Past Gophers, 4-3
October 24, 2003 | Women's Soccer
Katy Lindenmuth made sure the Wisconsin women's soccer team closed out the Big Ten season in style Friday night. The sophomore tallied two goals and an assist to lead the Badgers to a 4-3 victory at Minnesota in the Big Ten finale for both teams.
With the victory, the Badgers improve to 8-8-1 overall and finished the conference season tied for seventh place with a 4-6-0 mark. UW tied Michigan State in the conference standings, but the Badgers will be the No. 8 seed for the Big Ten Tournament since the Spartans defeated Wisconsin 2-1 on Sept. 28. Minnesota fell to 5-9-2 and 2-7-1 with the loss.
'I felt like we really put it together tonight,' Wisconsin head coach Dean Duerst said. 'It was one of those games where our girls played the Badger way. Even being a goal down twice, they were able to come back and stick with it.'
Lindenmuth notched both of her goals in the first half as the teams combined to score four times in the opening 45 minutes of play. Rebecca Dellaria got Minnesota on the board first with a goal at the 9:12 mark. Lindenmuth answered the Gopher goal with her first of the evening at 16:03. She put a header past Minnesota keeper Marni Prall following a header from Allison Preiss. Bethany Heine also picked up an assist on the play.
The tie didn't last long, however, as Laura Hoppe put the Gophers ahead 2-1 just 37 seconds later, rebounding Dellaria's shot off the post past UW keeper Stefani Szczechowski.
Lindenmuth helped send the teams into halftime tied 2-2 as she posted her second goal of the contest at the 40:57 mark after taking a centering pass from Lindsay Walker.
UW had a number of other quality scoring opportunities in the first half, outshooting Minnesota 11-6 and forcing Prall to make four saves. The Gopher team was credited with another save, stopping a Jessica Ring shot with just over 30 seconds remaining in the half.
Marisa Brown tallied her first goal of the season at 58:17 to put Wisconsin up 3-2. Brown took a long feed from Ring and put the shot past Prall from 15 yards out. Minnesota has a great chance to tie the game seven minutes later, but Szczechowski came up big for the Badgers, stopping Amanda McMahon's penalty kick.
UW got all the insurance it would need in the 81st minute, as Kara Kabellis headed a cross past Prall to put Wisconsin up 4-2. Hoppe recorded her second goal of the match in the 87th minute, but it proved to be too little, too late.
Wisconsin outshot Minnesota 21-14 for the match and held a slim 6-5 edge in corner kicks. Szcechowski picked up the win in goal, making four saves.
'It was great to see our kids going for it coming in, ' Duerst said. 'We needed that kind of a victory to lead us into the last home stretch.'
The Badgers open up their final week of regular season play at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday when they play host to UW-Milwaukee.
