UCF shuts out UH to claim tourney

Good wasn’t good enough for the Hawaii soccer team.

The Rainbow Wahine played strong in spurts and hung with No. 21 UCF for the first 40 minutes, but yielded goals going in and out of halftime in a 2-0 loss to the Knights on a blustery Sunday afternoon at Waipio Peninsula Soccer Stadium. UCF claimed the Ohana Hotels and Resorts No Ka Oi tournament title outright with the result and its 3-0 defeat of Washington on Friday.

UH (0-2), which lost to UNC-Greensboro in double-overtime on Friday, has already exceeded its home loss total from last season.

"This weekend for us built a lot of perspective," UH coach Michele Nagamine said. "It’s going to be a lot easier to talk to them and get them thinking in that mind-frame now that they’ve experienced the level of play, the discipline some of their opponents had this weekend."

It was UH’s first match against a ranked team since playing at No. 14 UC Irvine in 2011. Compounding matters, UH was without its best overall player, junior Krystal Pascua, who was red-carded late in the loss to Greensboro.

"Krystal is one of our strongest players … she’s a leader, she’s a captain," Nagamine said. "She learned a very valuable lesson the other night and she told me ‘Hey, it’s never going to happen again.’ … She’s maturing pretty nicely. But we definitely missed her today."

Nagamine went with true freshman Monk Berger for the duration in goal for this one, switching it up from Erica Young on Friday. Senior Skye Shimabukuro played up top in Pascua’s stead.

The Wahine were on the attack early and nearly got out of the first half unscathed, but UCF’s Alex Piercy sprung free in the box in the 41st minute and went to the far post past the outstretched fingers of an airborne Berger.

Mere seconds into the second half, Kayla Adamek collected the ball on a UH misclear and guided a slow bouncer past Berger.

"We just couldn’t put it in the back of the net," said senior captain Karli Look, one of two UH players on the all-tournament team along with freshman Kama Pascua. "We didn’t keep up the high pressure. One second we didn’t pressure as hard as we could have and they countered on us."

The Knights, of the rebranded American Athletic Conference (formerly the Big East), reached the NCAA tournament second round or better the past six seasons. That included the final eight in 2011.

"Our mentality was play hard, work hard," said first-year UCF coach Tiffany Roberts Sahaydak, a 1999 Women’s World Cup champion and an Olympic gold medalist.

The Wahine play a two-game road swing at Oregon and Oregon State on Sept. 6 and 8.

All-Tournament Team

Christina Archer, Washington
Kate Bennett, Washington
Marissa Diggs, UCF
Jen Martin, UCF
Karli Look, Hawaii
Kama Pascua, Hawaii
Lena Peterman, UCF
Jamie Simmons, UNC-Greensboro
Chesney White, UNC-Greensboro
Carleigh Williams, UCF
MVP: Tatiana Coleman, UCF