CU Buffs soccer advances to Sweet 16 with dominant win against Xavier

Colorado forward Hope Leyba celebrates the Buffaloes first goal during a win against Xavier in the second round of the NCAA Tournament Photo courtesy CU Athletics The Colorado women s soccer squad put together one of its best all-around performances this year on the biggest stage of the season The biggest stage so far at any rate Thanks to that performance the Buffaloes are moving onward and upward CU survived early pressure from Xavier to dominate the rest of the way recording a - accomplishment in an NCAA Tournament second-round match on Thursday in East Lansing Michigan The Buffs earned the third Sweet trip in campaign history and the second in seasons under head coach Danny Sanchez but it s the first time CU has advanced this far since Sanchez s second season in Boulder in The th-ranked third-seeded Buffs will stay in East Lansing to play the winner of Thursday night s second-round event between the second-seeded Michigan State Spartans and Wake Forest on Sunday a m MT ESPN Xavier pressed the issue offensively during the first minutes but consecutive header goals by CU s Faith Leyba and Reagan Kotschau reversed the complexion of the match and sent the Buffs - - on their way to the Sweet You set goals in July and early August when you re up in the mountains and you re doing club bonding and couldn t be more proud of the group for their effort and performance Sanchez reported I thought we were just a little bit tentative early for whatever reason We weren t giving them a ton of chances They had a couple half-chances But we were defending too deep But really Faith getting the goal in the corner and obviously the second goal really helped settle us Felt good about it and we defended well Defender Jordan Whiteaker delivered both corner kicks that ended with CU s first two goals with Leyba opening the scoring with her third goal of the season Leyba almost recorded the second goal but after her header bounced off the crossbar Kotschau cleaned up the rebound to give CU a - lead that held until the latter stages of the match A -yard bomb from Hope Leyba gave the Buffs a - lead with a little less than minutes remaining and extended her team-record goal total to Although a tally by Xavier ruined a doable shutout for what otherwise was a standout performance by CU goalie Jordan Nytes a couple of the Buffs reserves were able to get in on the scoring in the final seconds with Riley MacDonald capping the scoring off an assist from Josie Master Related Articles Two of nation s top attacks collide as CU Buffs soccer meets Xavier in NCAA Tournament DU Pioneers men s soccer draws UC Irvine for NCAA Tournament opener DU Pioneers win Summit League men s soccer title for final time as conference member Colorado Buffaloes women s soccer advances past Utah Valley in double-overtime Twins Hope Faith Leyba have CU Buffs soccer eyeing deep NCAA Tournament run Nytes recorded saves the majority of by any CU goalie in the Buffs all-time NCAA Tournament games Whiteaker became just the third CU performer to record two assists in an NCAA Tournament competition and the first since CU s four goals marked the second-most for the campaign in a tournament encounter trailing only the six scored in a first-round win against Northern Colorado The Buffs five assists also was the second-most in the crew s tournament history trailing the six recorded in that same competition against Northern Colorado We came into the match with a really good encounter plan Nytes disclosed We knew they had top goal-scorers in the country so that s obviously something we look at With Faith and Greer Maguire in front of me as center backs it s never really a issue We know what to do We know to buy into the battle plan Everybody s effort in the defense was just super incredible CU Buffs soccer Xavier Xavier Colorado Goals Colorado F Leyba Whiteaker th minute Kotschau F Leyba Whiteaker nd minute H Leyba Zacarias th minute MacDonald Master th minute Xavier Pennekamp Flick th minute Goalies Min -goals against-saves Xavier Galley - - Colorado Nytes - - Want more sports news Sign up for the Sports Omelette to get all our analysis on Denver s teams