Box score
WEST POINT, NY—Three different players scored goals for Army in its 3-0 victory over visiting NJIT in Friday night women's soccer action on the campus of the United States Military Academy.
The game was the second for Army (1-1) and the 2009 season opener for the Highlanders. Ashleigh Sheets, Candice Bryan and Deanna Clegg all notched goals for the Black Knights and 2008 first team Academic All-America Elizabeth Betterbed recorded an assist on the scores by Bryan and Clegg.
Army, the defending Patriot League champion and a participant in the 2008 NCAA Division I Women's College Cup postseason, got what proved to be the only scoring it needed when Sheets connected for her first goal of the season, unassisted, in the eighth minute, firing the ball into the lower right corner past NJIT junior goalkeeper Sadie Mele off a rebound.
Betterbed found Bryan close to the Highlander goal, where she finished Army's second tally at 33:06 and then Betterbed and Clegg got together for the only scoring of the second half with just under 28 minutes remaining.
Betterbed, an all-Patriot League honoree in 2008, incidentally ranks first academically in the senior class at West Point with a 4.235 cumulative GPA majoring in mechanical engineering.
NJIT's Mele made five stops, while Army keeper Alex Lostetter needed two saves to register the shutout.
The Highlanders were credited with four shots—one apiece for Michelle Borth, Kori Washington, Briana Morales, and Jennifer Kalczewski. Borth and Morales, both of whom are back in health after injury-troubled 2008 seasons, put their shots on goal.
Five freshmen made their college debuts for NJIT. Chacha Naito, Meryl Hershfield, and Amanda Dotten started, while Mariam Bestawros and Gechi Ukaegbu came off the bench.
The Highlanders will be back in action quickly, heading even farther upstate New York to Buffalo, where they will take on Canisius in a 1 pm start on Sunday.
That game will be the home opener for Canisius, which tied Youngstown State in its season opener Friday in Ohio. The Golden Griffins, a strong foe, were 11-5-3 overall and 6-1-1 at home in 2008.
