The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
Soccer lands five on Big 12 All-Tournament Team
11.05.2023 | Soccer
The Big 12 Conference’s postseason champions tie a program best with five all-tournament selections.
ROUND ROCK, Texas – The head coaches of the participating women's soccer programs in the 2023 Sprouts Farmers Market Big 12 Soccer Championship took notice of the play of several Texas Longhorn student-athletes throughout the week-long tournament as UT tied a program record with five of the 11 Big 12 All-Tournament selections, the league announced Sunday afternoon.
With head coaches were not allowed to vote for their own student-athletes, the quintet of Longhorn student-athletes — Mia Justus (goalkeeper), Lauren Lapomarda (defender), Lexi Missimo (midfielder), Trinity Byars (forward) and Holly Ward (forward) — made up 45.5 percent of the team. The five selections from the 2023 Texas team were tied with the 2021 squad for the most Big 12 All-Tournament selections from a single tournament in the program's history.
With their all-tournament selections, Missimo (2021-23) and Byars (2021-23) have tied Dianna Pfenninger (2005-07) and Kasey Moore (2005-07) as the only student-athletes in program history to not only earn three career all-tournament selections but to do so in three consecutive postseason conference tournaments.
Missimo, who was also named the tournament's most outstanding offensive player, led all participating student-athletes in points (9), points per match (3.00), shots (14), goals (4) and goals per match (1.33). Despite scoring just two goals to go along with two assists, Byars contributed to Missimo's stat line by drawing two penalty kick opportunities against West Virginia and BYU, respectively, that Missimo converted into goals. Ward was one of three different Longhorn student-athletes (Missimo and Byars) to score a goal during the tournament with her goal coming in the 75th minute of Saturday's match against BYU to seal UT's championship victory.
Justus, who was in addition named as the tournament's most outstanding defensive player, and Lapomarda led a Longhorn defensive unit that allowed just two total goals — a 0.66 goals allowed per match average — and held a BYU offense — one that entered Saturday night's championship match — that led the nation in scoring offense and goals to just one first-half goal. The defense also pitched a clean sheet against the league's regular season champions, Texas Tech, during Wednesday afternoon's semifinal match.
UP NEXT
Texas (15-4-2) will find out its next postseason opponent during the NCAA Division I Women's Soccer Selection Show at 3 p.m. CT / 4 p.m. ET on Monday, Nov. 6.
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