MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Bianca St. Georges scored twice in the final 13 minutes as No. 16 West Virginia rallied to stun No. 13 Texas 2-1 on Sunday in women’s soccer action.
Trailing 1-0 in the 77th minute, the Mountaineers (8-3-3, 4-1) earned a break when Texas was whistled for a foul inside the box. St. Georges buried her second penalty kick of the season for the equalizer.
Just 3:09 later, St. Georges delivered her first career game-winning goal.
After Hannah Abraham’s cross was headed out of the box, St. Georges pounced on the ball, beat one defender and directed a left-footed shot past Texas goalkeeper Nicole Curry.
Coming off Friday’s loss to No. 24 Baylor that snapped a decade long winning streak in conference home games, WVU was in danger of another setback until the late-game heroics of St. Georges.
“It’s all about West Virginia pride,” St. Georges said. “We were fighting for our program. This was a way for us to respond to Friday’s game. We were very disappointed, and we weren’t going to let this one slip today.”
The Longhorns (10-2-2, 2-2-1) jumped ahead in the 19th minute as Haley Berg directed her shot from 16-yards out.
West Virginia finished with a 19-5 shots advantage and a 9-0 edge in corner kicks.
“Look at what Bianca did. Everything was playing against us today, but with adversity we found true character and responded,” Mountaineers coach Nikki Izzo-Brown said. “Bianca has the biggest clock when it comes to moving, moving, moving – she is nonstop. If there’s someone to earn a goal, it’s Bianca St. Georges. She never stops and just goes, goes, goes.”
The Mountaineers appeared to have tied it at 1-1 in the 51st minute when Sh’Nia Gordon received a ball behind Texas’ back line and scored from a sharp right angle. However an offside call negating the goal.
“You could see the girls went into overdrive and had a no-quit mentality,” Izzo-Brown said. “We had a goal called back, and the girls kept pushing, and that’s not easy. Mental toughness stepped up, and that’s where our seniors came in.”