Mocs Soccer Hosts Austin Peay, Eastern Kentucky This Weekend
Thursday, August 17, 2017
The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga women's soccer team will open the 2017 with a pair of home matches. The Mocs will take on Austin Peay in the season-opener Friday, August 18 at 7:00 p.m. Sunday's matchup against Eastern Kentucky will kick off at 2:00 p.m. Admission is free to all of Chattanooga's home matches.
"We're as ready as we can be to this point," Chattanooga head coach Gavin McKinney said. "Our preseason was 2-1/2 week essentially before our first game. It's a pretty condensed camp. We learned a lot from our two preseason games. Hopefully we can build off those. We think we've fixed a few things leading into this weekend."
Chattanooga returns eight from last season's squad that finished tied for fifth in the Southern Conference standings, its best finish since 2005. Sophomore Jordan Mueller, a SoCon All-Freshman Team selection last season, returns to the lineup. She ranked third on the team in scoring and second for most goals. Senior McKenzie Gregg led the team in assists in 2016 and was fifth on the team in scoring. She has seven career goals and nine assists from her midfield position. Starting keeper sophomor Melia Correa makes her return and will be joined in the net by transfer Bailey Coppedge and redshirt sophomore Molli Miller. In preseason play, the Mocs earned a 1-1 draw at Tennessee Tech and fell 3-0 to Belmont. Both contests were played on the road. Freshman Chloe Arnold scored the Mocs goal against the Golden Eagles.
"We really like the makeup and personality of the team," McKinney said. "We think its a bunch of kids that want to learn and get better. They are willing to work for each other and battle for each other. We think they've been fantastic in their approach and mentality up to this point. Our team retreat was great from a team-building standpoint. They got to know each other better.
"We're excited to see where this season takes us."