San Marcos - Texas State ended Sam Houston's 2010 soccer season Thursday night with a 2-1 victory over the Bearkats in the first round of the Southland post-season tournament.
Britney Curry scored in the 44th minute and Jessica Elting added insurance in the 80th to put the Bobcats 2-0. Sam Houston's Tricia Mallory scored from the right side of the box off a pass from Kirby Zak with 3:55 remaining in the contest.
The goal was Mallory's 11th of the season, two more than the Sam Houston record for goals in a season by a freshman set by Zak last year.
Curry broke a scoreless deadlock just 1:28 before intermission, taking a pass from Felicia Leask on the right wing and breaking open in the six-yard box for a punch into the middle of the net. The goal was the 14th of the season for Curry, the Southland's leading scorer.
Elting scored on a long shot from just outside the left corner of the penalty area with 10:02 remaining in the contest.
Senior goalkeeper Jenny Pence kept the game close with several outstanding saves including a stop on a point blank shot by Curry on a breakaway a minute before the second Bobcat goal.
Sam Houston best's opportunity to score in the first half came 12 minutes before intermission as Tricia Mallory got free 12 yards from the middle of the goal and right-footed a shot that goalkeeper Lauren Frazier stopped but could not hold. Before Mallory could get to the ball, a Bobcat defender knocked it out of danger.
"We changed up some things tactically from what we did in the match with Texas State Sunday," head coach Tom Brown said. "That created some early chances for us that, if we had converted, might have made this a different match. Texas State did a good job of pressuring us throughout the field. They kept us from connecting from back to front like we wanted to."
The Bobcats, who came into the tournament as the No. 4 seed, upped their season record to 12-7-1 for the season while Sam Houston ended the year 9-11-1.
"Overall, we thought this was a good season," Brown said. "This really is our second complete recruiting class and we're making progress. With another strong recruiting year, we're looking forward to 2011."
The match marked the fourth appearance in the Southland Conference post-season event for Sam Houston in the programs eight year history. The loss marked the second year in a row the Bobcats eliminated the Bearkats from the tournament. The score in last year's game also was 2-1.
