No. 20 Soccer preview: vs. West Virginia [Big 12 Semifinal]

Big 12 SEMIFINAL: West Virginia (10-5-4, 3-3-3 Big 12) vs. #20 Texas (11-3-5, 6-0-3 Big 12)

Time: Thursday, Nov. 4 – 7 p.m. CT

Location: Round Rock, Texas (Round Rock Multipurpose Complex)

TV: The match will be web-streamed live on Big 12 Now on ESPN+ and can be watched online for a subscription fee.

Live Stats: LINK

Free Kicks:

Texas trails its overall series against West Virginia by a total of 2-9-2 and is 0-1-1 all-time in Big 12 Championship contests against the Mountaineers. WVU has won four of the last five meetings in the series dating back to UT's last win in 2017. In all, 11 of the 13 total match-ups (including a 0-0, 2OT tie in Austin back on Oct. 21) have been settled by one goal or needed overtime.

Freshmen Trinity Byars and Lexi Missimo are making runs at some longtime program single-season records. Check out where they currently rank below:

Single-Season Goals: Texas record is 16 goals by Kelly Wilson (2004)

Trinity Byars has 12 goals to rank 6th in Texas history - needs one to move into T5th

Single-Season Assists: Texas record is 14 assists by Kelly Wilson (2004)

Lexi Missimo has 13 assists to rank tied for 2nd in Texas history

Rookie standouts Lexi Missimo and Trinity Byars are also threatening some longstanding Texas freshman single-season records. Missimo has already tied Kati McBain's freshman mark of 13 assists from the 2000 season, while Byars needs one more goal and four more points to equal Kelly Wilson's 13-goal, 38-point output as a rookie back in 2001.

Texas is currently riding a program-record-tying 13-match unbeaten run dating back to Sept. 12, tying the record held by the 2006 & 2017 Longhorns. During their skein, the Longhorns have outscored opponents by a total of 31-8, fired off an average of 17.8 shots-per-match and registered eight shutouts. Eight different Texas players have scored goals over that stretch led by the "Run BMG" trio of Byars (12 goals), Missimo (seven goals) and Grosso (four goals) as well as senior forward Mackenzie McFarland (four goals). Fifth-year senior goalkeeper Savannah Madden has posted a 0.59 GAA and an .857 save percentage while making 48 saves over 1224:26 of match action.

The release of the annual Big 12 Conference awards contained a lot of Burnt Orange. Lexi Missimo earned Texas' seventh all-time (and fourth over the last six years) nod as the Big 12 Conference Freshman of the Year and joined Trinity Byars and Julia Grosso on the All-Big 12 First Team. Savannah Madden, EmJ Cox and Emma Regan received All-Big 12 Second Team honors, while Cox, Byars and Missimo were each named to the Big 12 All-Freshman Team. The six total honorees marked the most in a single season for the Texas program since 2006.

Lexi Missimo now owns an impressive 12 career goals, 15 career assists and 39 career points over her first 22 collegiate matches. She became the fastest Longhorns player to reach 10 goals in program history (12 matches), breaking former Longhorns All-American Kelly Wilson's (2001) record by one match. Trinity Byars is right on her teammate's heels with 12 goals and 10 assists for 34 points over her first 19 career matches.

The Longhorns have won 42 consecutive matches in which they scored two-or-more goals in a contest dating back to the start of the 2017 season. The last time Texas failed to win when tickling the twine on two occasions was in a 3-2 defeat at TCU back on Oct. 28, 2016.

UT is 35-3-3 since the start of the 2018 season when scoring first in a match & is 10-0-2 in such contests in 2021.

The University of Texas at Austin Athletics