Oct. 25, 2006
FULLERTON, CA - Long Beach State's Kim Silos scored the game-winning goal in the 45th minute and the 49ers clinched at least a share of the Big West Conference title and the host's role for next weekend's conference tournament with a 1-0 victory over Cal State Fullerton on Wednesday night at Titan Stadium.
The Titans fell to 8-7-2 overall, 3-2-1 in league play with the loss while the 49ers improved to 14-3-1, 5-0-1 in the Big West.
The nationally televised Fox Soccer Channel contest drew a crowd of 1,187 - the third-largest crowd to watch a women's soccer contest at Titan Stadium in the history of the program.
The record is 1,570, also set against Long Beach State, on Oct. 19, 2001 - a 1-0 Titan victory.
The two teams played even for the first 44 minutes of the match before the 49ers struck for the first goal of the contest with only seconds remaining in the half.
Yeraldy Hurtado dribbled down the left side before giving the ball up to Silos at the top of the box. Silos then danced her way through the defense and fired a sharp-angled shot from five yards out that deflected off a Fullerton defender with 25 seconds left to make it 1-0.
The unassisted strike with the ninth goal of the year for Silos.
Fullerton, which outshot Long Beach State 5-2 in the opening period and 8-4 for the match, had three golden chances to tie the score in the second half.
The first came in the 55th minute as Lauren Cram danced past three defenders and got a shot off to the far left post that trickled just wide of a diving Liz Ramos.
The second came with just over 13 minutes left in the match as a ball that was deflected off of Ramos fell to the feet of Fullerton senior Emmy Dokulil, whose shot sailed just high past a wide open net, preserving the 49ers' lead.
Seconds later, a pop up by Brianna Buffington from the top of the box floated in toward Ramos, who was standing on the goal line, but the ball deflected off the crossbar back into play where it was cleared away by Long Beach State.
The match marked the national television debut for both the Titans and 49ers.
Long Beach State will now host the 2006 Big West Conference Tournament on Nov. 3 and 5 at George Allen Field. Pairings and game times will be announced at a later date.
Fullerton concludes its 2006 regular season on Sunday (Oct. 29) with a 7 p.m. kick-off against UC Irvine at Anteater Stadium.