Heels Emerge Victorious In Defensive Battle With Bruins

Friday, September 9

Los Angeles, Calif.

10:00 PM

North Carolina

5-0-1

UCLA

3-2-0

North Carolina

UCLA

September 10, 2016 | Women's Soccer

Box Score

By: UNC Athletic Communications

LOS ANGELES, CALIF. – In a hard-fought defensive battle between eighth-ranked North Carolina and ninth-ranked UCLA, the Tar Heels persevered to claim a 2-1 women's soccer victory before 1,801 fans Friday night at Drake Stadium.

Goals by Annie Kingman and Megan Buckingham provided the offense the Tar Heels would need as they improved to 5-0-1 on the season. UCLA fell to 3-2 with the loss. Carolina is now 11-1-1 all-time against the Bruins and it has won two in a row in the series against UCLA.

The win was the 797th career victory for Tar Heel head coach Anson Dorrance who has led UNC to a 797-63-33 record over his 38 years as head coach.

Neither team's defense allowed the opposing team's offense to get many opportunities in the match. Each team took eight shots and each team had five corner kicks. UCLA had five shots on goal while the Tar Heels put four of their eight shots on target. Carolina outshot the Bruins 4-3 in the first half and UCLA outshot Carolina 5-4 in the second half.

Both goalkeepers went the full 90 minutes between the posts with UNC's Lindsey Harris making four saves and allowing just one goal. Teagan Micah made two saves and allowed two goals for the home standing Bruins.

Carolina scored the opening goal of the game at 26:43 as Annie Kingman successfully converted a penalty kick after a foul by the Bruins in the Tar Heels' attacking 18-yard box. Kingman has now scored goals in back-to-back games after not having recorded a goal since the second game of the 2015 season.

UCLA equalized at 54:13 as Jessie Fleming tallied for the Bruins on a shot from close range. Both Annie Alvarado and Anika Rodriguez assisted on the goal.

Carolina got the game-winning goal from Megan Buckingham at the 68:50 mark. It was the first goal of the season for the Michigan native. After UNC earned a corner kick, the Bruins initially cleared the ball out of the box but Buckingham was there to strike from long range, scoring past Micah to put the Tar Heels up 2-1.

UNC's defense took care of things after that as it limited the Bruins to just three shots in the final 21 minutes of play, none of which found the back of the net.

Carolina head coach Anson Dorrance made liberal use of his bench with 19 players seeing action compared to 15 for UCLA. Julia Ashley, Buckingham, Hanna Gardner, Harris and Maggie Bill played all 90 minutes for the Tar Heels.

UNC will continue its Southern California trip on Sunday when it plays at USC (4-2) at McAlister Stadium. The Trojans beat Loyola Marymount Friday 2-0 and they have now won four games in a row. Sunday's game will be telecast on the Pac 12 Network (4 p.m. EDT, 1 p.m. PDT).