The UT Longhorn attack finally got untracked Sunday in Los Angeles, and the Horns turned some heads by knocking off national powerhouse UCLA, 2-1. Goals from senior Kelsey Shimmick and freshman Alexa Adams broke a 322-minute scoring drought for Texas, and Abby Smith‘s career-high 11 saves gave them a split on their Southern California trip, after a 2-0 loss Friday at UC-Santa Barbara. The Horns are home this weekend, hosting Oregon State this Thursday at 6:30pm, then Abilene Christian at 1pm Sunday, Sept. 13.
The St. Edward’s women debuted at No. 17 in the first Div. II poll, with the Hilltopper men at No. 22. They’re both on the road in Colorado this weekend; the women will be back to host Western Washington at 1pm Wednesday, Sept. 16.
The Austin Aztex stayed mathematically alive in the USL West playoff hunt with a solid 2-1 win over Seattle, but they have to win their last three games, all on the road, and overturn a big goal-differential deficit. A goal and an assist from Romain Gall were the difference, and they marked the first major contribution all season from any of the players on loan from Columbus Crew. The Aztex are playing at Colorado Springs as we go to press, then finish the season in the Pacific Northwest – at Seattle next Thursday, Sept. 17, and Vancouver on Sunday, Sept. 20. You can watch any of those games live at www.austinaztex.com or at Haymaker, 2310 Manor Rd.
We’re into that crazy fall season in world football when the top clubs are playing in multiple competitions at once, and top players shuttle back and forth playing for their club team and their national team. This past weekend was reserved for international games: In Europe, the next-to-last week of Euro 2016 qualifiers left England the only team with a perfect record after eight games, and Netherlands looking out of it after embarrassing losses to Iceland and Turkey. On this side of the pond, the U.S. men played a pair of friendlies, beating Peru 2-1 on Friday, then looking clueless against Brazil on Tuesday in a 4-1 loss. And Guatemala and St. Vincent and the Grenadines advanced in qualifying for World Cup 2018; they’ll join the U.S. and Trinidad and Tobago (perhaps featuring the Aztex’s Trevin Caesar) in the fourth-round group stage starting in November. The next international break will be Oct. 8-13, with the final Euro qualifying games, and the U.S. hosting Mexico in a Confederations Cup playoff at the Rose Bowl on Oct. 9.
The European Champions League group stage begins next week with some juicy matchups, on several Fox channels at 1:45pm Tue.-Wed.; My picks: Manchester City-Juventus or PSV Eindhoven-Manchester United on Tuesday, Roma-Barcelona and Dinamo Zagreb-Arsenal on Wednesday… CONCACAF Champions League is back next week as well: DC United hosts the Panamanian champion Árabe Unido at 7pm Tuesday on FS2.
This article appears in September 11 • 2015.