Big East Women’s Soccer Semifinals: Marquette Beats St. John’s In Overtime

Carrie Madden scored twice, including a golden goal bicycle kick in overtime, to propel Marquette women’s soccer to a 2-1 win over St. John’s in the Big East tournament semifinals. The Golden Eagles advance to Sunday’s title game where they will play the winner of the DePaul/Georgetown semifinal.

Madden made a stylish finish for the match when she collected the Madison Dunker service out in front of the St. John’s net and flicked the ball over her head. The shot took keeper Diana Poulin completely off guard and she never had a chance as it went into the deep left corner of the net.

As amazing as the goal itself was, Madden’s mere presence on the field was almost as surprising. The redshirt sophomore had to be helped off the field by a Marquette trainer with less than two minutes remaining in regulation, as she limped on her right leg. As it turns out, it was merely a circumstance of needing a moment to recover and needing to be subbed off as a result of the stoppage so late in the match, and Madden was back on the pitch to start overtime.

St. John’s started out the match with a flurry of offense, including a shot that went off the post and another that was swallowed up by keeper Maddy Henry before the Red Storm could get off a shot. It was Shea Connors, the same player that put it off the post, sending it home for the 1-0 lead in the 29th minute.

Marquette pushed back against the St. John’s attack and eventually leveled the match on a perfectly laid in cross by Liz Bartels. Madden found enough space between two SJU defenders to aim her header at the left post, far from the reach of Poulin.

Officially, Henry finishes with two saves on the day, but it was her fearless protection of the area in front of her net that snuffed out attack after attack. Even as a freshman, Henry has repeatedly shown no fear this season in chasing after a ball in the penalty area to make sure that her opponents don’t get a shot off, and that sense of timing and athleticism paid off for the Golden Eagles today.

How about a full highlights package, courtesy of GoMarquette.com and the Big East Digital Network?

Marquette will have to wait til the conclusion of the second semifinal match to see who they will play on Sunday afternoon. The title game will be televised on FS1 starting at noon Central.