STARKVILLE — Mississippi State soccer kept rolling on Sunday, dominating LSU in a 2-0 home win. The Bulldogs moved to 9-1 and 3-0 in Southeastern Conference play thanks to another shutout performance by the defense and a pair of powerful strikes from Ally Perry.
“LSU is a quality side,” Bulldogs head coach James Armstrong said. “They have had some really good results and will continue to have good results down the stretch. For us tonight to get 12 corners, 22 shots and limit them to one shot, it says a lot about the overall performance of the group.”
The brace from Perry makes it six goals in five games, a prolific output for the attacking midfielder. She took nine shots on the night for the Bulldogs, a reflection of her confidence at the moment and the faith her teammates have in her to hit the target. The second goal came through an open-play setup, but the goal that broke the deadlock was by design.
“I feel like they look for me and Aitana to get the shots off,” she said after the game. “We practiced (the first goal) and we just thought, ‘Why not?’”
The opening goal came from a set-piece routine, one drawn up by the players and assistant coaches Nick Zimmerman and Kat Stratton. Ines Simas took a short corner kick to Ilana Izquierdo, who played the ball to Aitana Martinez-Montoya on the edge of the box. The Spaniard drew a defender, opening space for Perry at the top of the box to receive the final pass and fire a left-footed shot into the top-left corner of the net.
“Nick and Kat have done a great job with that,” Armstrong said of the set-piece coaching. “The second one also came kind of from a set piece, in the second phase. Ally hits the frame and she’s got a great shot with the right foot and left foot, she’s playing great soccer right now.”
The Bulldogs’ dominance once again came from their defensive identity, something which has seen the team blank all but one of their opponents. The Tigers didn’t record a single shot on target the entire night as they struggled to even hold onto possession against the Bulldog press.
It’s a central part of the team’s identity, and has been since Armstrong took over, but this season the team’s work-rate in pressing to win the ball has taken them to a new level, something Armstrong and the players credit to the arrival of assistant coach Drago Ceranic.
“Bringing Coach Drago in created a whole new culture of what defense means to us,” midfielder Macey Hodge said. “That is the foundation of what we do, we like working extremely hard behind the ball to put us in a position to score and just the overall mindset has changed the group’s dynamic.”
MSU missed out on an away trip to face No. 23 South Carolina last week because of Hurricane Helene, but there’s another ranked conference opponent on the way this week. The Bulldogs will face undefeated No. 2 Arkansas at 6 p.m. Friday, a test they want an extra boost from the fans for.
“The fans, if they can come out here, they make a massive difference,” he said. “We are looking to break the 2,000 person attendance record; it has never been done before. 2,000 people ringing cowbells can sound like 15,000 people and that is what we are hoping for.”
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