Denver 1-0 Northern Colorado (Dancy 72’)

DENVER– Junior forward Jessie Dancy (Park City, Utah) netted her first career goal in the 72^nd minute to send the University of Denver women’s soccer team to its second-straight victory, this one a 1-0 result over Northern Colorado on Thursday night at CIBER Field at the University of Denver Soccer Stadium.

“In the first half I didn’t think we were quite as sharp as we ended up being in the second half,” head coach Jeff Hooker said. “Our movement off the ball was a little bit stagnant, and we didn’t show a lot of creativity. The second half that movement was really there, and our midfield and forwards were clicking, while also allowing our defenders to get in the picture late. We had a lot more secured possession in the second half. I thought we had a lot of good combinations, better than the ones that we scored the goal on, but that was just a great individual effort for Jessie to finish that opportunity.”

Thursday night’s only goal came off a good stint of possession for the Pioneers (3-4-0). Freshman midfielder Hannah Adler (Oak Park, Calif.) started the attack down the center of the park, played it out to the right to outside back Makenzie Bothner (Park City, Utah) who back-heeled it to the run of forward Angelica Pacheco (Taos, N.M.). The DU junior clipped a ball into classmate Dancy, who took a composed touch and sent her strike into the bottom left corner from 15 yards out.

“We said at the beginning of the year that unless someone really picked everyone up on their back, that it was going to be goal scoring by committee this year,” Hooker said. “We’ve scored a lot of different types of goals. To get them from a variety of spots is giving a lot of our attacking players’ confidence.”

The assist was the second of the campaign and the fifth of Bothner’s career, while Pacheco was credited with her first career assist.

Denver outshot the Bears (3-3-1) 16-9 on the evening, including 11-3 in the first half.

“I thought Northern Colorado was really dangerous tonight off the counter,” Hooker said. “They countered off one of our corners, and then got a free header off a corner there at the end. I thought they did a really good job of defending in the right spots when we had the ball.”

DU’s two goalkeepers both saw action for the sixth match in seven. Senior Cassidy Rey (Arcadia, Calif.) made her third start of the season and was called upon to make a single save. Freshman Brittany Wilson (Littleton, Colo.) also made a single-save in the second stanza to complete the combined shutout for the Pioneers.