San Jose 3, San Diego 1
June 9, 2002 - Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA) News Release
SAN JOSE, CA - Katia scored two goals and Tisha Venturini-Hoch added one score as the San Jose CyberRays downed the San Diego Spirit 3-1 Sunday afternoon at Spartan Stadium. The defending champion CyberRays improve to 4-3-2 (14 pts.) with the victory, while San Diego slumps to 2-5-2 (8 pts.) in Spirit General Manager Kevin Crow's first game as interim head coach.
San Jose, which had struggled with finishing for most of the season, jumped out to an early lead in the 26th minute when Venturini-Hoch scored her first goal of the year. San Diego's defense cleared a corner kick, but San Jose's Michelle French collected the ball and bent a pretty pass to Venturini-Hoch who smacked a header in from four yards.
The CyberRays made it 2-0 in the 31st minute when Katia took the ball from San Diego defender Fan Yunjie, who was trying to clear the ball out of bounds. The Brazilian forward went straight down the line and slammed the ball past San Diego goalkeeper Jaime Pagliarulo at the near post.
Katia made it 3-0 in the four minutes later when she scored what many are calling the early favorite for WUSA goal of the year. Pretinha started the play when she chipped a ball from the right flank to Katia, who collected the ball in the air and hammered in an amazing volley from a steep angle into the far post. The Brazilian's ability to collect the pass and generate a shot before the ball hit the ground brought CyberRays fans to their feet.
San Diego struggled for most of the day against the CyberRays, but the Spirit finally put one on the scoreboard in the 75th minute when Zhang Ouying scored her fourth goal of the season. Shannon MacMillan served a pretty ball from the right side and the Zhang flashed through the middle of the box to snap a header past San Jose goalkeeper Lakeysia Beene from seven yards.
With her two goals on the evening, Katia moved into the top spot among WUSA scorers (tied with Boston's Maren Meinert), as the Brazilian national team star now has six goals and one assist for 13 points in 2002.
Women's United Soccer Association Stories from June 9, 2002
- Beat Defeats Power 2-0 Extending Winning Streak to Four Games - Atlanta Beat
- San Jose 3, San Diego 1 - WUSA
- Atlanta 2, New York 0 - WUSA
- Spirit Falls, 3-1, to San Jose CyberRays - San Diego Spirit
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