BYU Women’s Soccer Opens Season With Dominant Win Over Rival Utah

HERRIMAN, Utah – BYU women’s soccer has the makings of one of the nation’s best offenses in this unprecedented 2021 season.

The 10th ranked Cougars opened up the 2021 spring season Saturday night with a dominant 5-1 victory over rival Utah at the Zions Bank RSL Academy in Herriman.

Final from Zions Bank Real Academy: @byusoccer_w defeats @UtahWSoccer 5-1.#BYUwSOC #GoUtes #GoCougs pic.twitter.com/Co5nKVv4O2

— KSL Sports (@kslsports) February 7, 2021

Last season, BYU boasted the No. 2 scoring offense in the country before falling in the Elite Eight to eventual National Champion Stanford. Despite losing Elise Flake to graduation, BYU showed on Saturday they have another high-powered attack this spring.

The scoring got started early as senior forward Cameron Tucker scored in the 5th minute to give BYU an early 1-0 lead. Utah answered back with an equalizer from Anna Escobedo in the 18th minute, giving head coach Jen Rockwood’s 10th ranked team in the country their first taste of adversity in the young season.

“We came out strong. One of the things we talked about coming into this game was to do a better job getting to the ball,” said Rockwood. “Anytime you take a little breather on that throw-in, crazy things can happen in soccer. Really it was the only look that we kind of gave up. You just never know when a goal can come. It’s a good lesson to learn from that. Utah did a good job. They got back in it and we kind of had to refocus and I thought the girls did a really good job of refocusing and not getting frustrated by that.”

BYU refocused with three more goals before the half as sophomore forward Rachel McCarthy put the Cougars back in front in the 27th minute. Then redshirt sophomore Bella Folino, who missed all of last season except one game due to injury, scored in the 32nd minute.

Cameron Tucker got back in the scoring act before the half with a second goal in the 36th. She then capped off her impressive season opener with a hat trick, scoring in the 74th minute to put an exclamation mark on BYU’s 5-1 victory over the rival Utes.

.@camerontuckerr with the hat-trick 😍#GoCougs | #BYUwSOC pic.twitter.com/TXJ3JhC5xq

— BYU Women's Soccer (@byusoccer_w) February 7, 2021

“Cam is someone that has lots of expectations. We’re excited about her,” said Rockwood. “She had a great year last year and we know she’s going to have a real breakout year this year. She’s so capable of scoring goals and hard to contain.”

BYU now heads on the road for a huge road trip against two of the top programs in the Pac-12 and in women’s soccer this year, as they face No. 4 UCLA on Friday, February 12th, and then make the trek across Los Angeles to No. 14 USC on Monday, February 15th.

Utah goes on the road to face Dixie State in St. George on February 11th before returning to RSL Academy to host Weber State on February 14th.

Mitch Harper is a BYU Insider for sports.ksl.com and host of the Cougar Tracks Podcast (SUBSCRIBE) and Cougar Sports Saturday (Saturday from 12–3 p.m., KSL Newsradio). Follow him on Twitter: @Mitch_Harper and the KSL Sports app.