The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
SMU
No. 12 Soccer preview: at SMU
08.20.2024 | Soccer
Texas set to play first regular season women’s soccer road match at SMU since 2004
AUSTIN, Texas – After a successful season-opening weekend that saw the Texas Longhorns earn two wins, head coach Angela Kelly and her women's soccer program will now make a quick, three-hour trip up I-35 to play SMU at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Aug. 22.
The match will serve as Texas' only road non-conference regular season match in 2024 as well as the last contest for the Longhorns away from Mike A. Myers Stadium until Sunday, Sept. 22, when UT plays its first-ever road SEC match in Starkville, Miss. It'll also mark the first time Texas has played SMU in Dallas since Sunday, Nov. 14, when the Mustangs knocked off the Longhorns, 2-0, in the first round of the 2021 NCAA Tournament.
TELEVISION: Steve Lansdale and John Liddle will serve as the broadcast talent for the match that can be watched on ACC Network Extra and streamed on the ESPN app.
KICKING OFF
- On Thursday evening, Texas will be looking for its first-ever win against SMU in a soccer match played in Dallas, Texas:
- L, 0-2: Nov. 14, 2021**First round of the 2021 NCAA Tournament.
- T, 2-2 (2OT): Oct. 27, 2004
- T, 1-1 (2OT): Sept. 11, 1996
- L, 1-3 (OT): Sept. 16, 1994
- If Lexi Missimo (5,960:36) plays 40-or-more minutes of Thursday night's match versus the Mustangs, the Southlake native will join Lauren Lapomarda (6,233:05) as the only active Texas Longhorn women's soccer student-athletes to play 6,000-or-more career minutes in the UT Burnt Orange and White.
- Graduate students Hannah Waesch (6,650:27) and Madison Haugen (6,056:56) have also surpassed 6,000 career minutes played throughout their collegiate soccer careers, but only 1,811:27 (Waesch – Auburn) and 148:28 (Haugen – Georgia) have come during their time on the Forty Acres.
- Trinity Byars is on pace to join Missimo and Lapomarda later this season as the Richardson, Texas native has spent 5,425:29 on the pitch throughout her four-year career at Texas.
- When Lexi Missimo and Trinity Byars take the pitch at Washburne Soccer and Track Stadium for Thursday's action, the pair of Texas Longhorns will do so as two of just three active Division I women's soccer student-athletes with 30-or-more goals and 20-or-more assists throughout their collegiate soccer careers.
- Byars: 48 goals, 35 assists
- Missimo: 46 goals, 51 assists
- The pair entered the 2024 season as the only active student-athletes to have reached those numbers, but South Carolina's Catherine Barry was credited with an assist on the Gamecocks' second goal in a 5-1 win over Furman on Sunday, Aug. 19.
- The assist pushed Barry's career assist total to 20 to go along with her 34 career goals.
- The pair entered the 2024 season as the only active student-athletes to have reached those numbers, but South Carolina's Catherine Barry was credited with an assist on the Gamecocks' second goal in a 5-1 win over Furman on Sunday, Aug. 19.
- A potential clean sheet victory for Texas goalkeeper Mia Justus would mark the first time the Longhorns have opened a season with three consecutive clean sheets since 1999.
- Aug. 27 – W, 1-0 vs. Oklahoma
- Aug. 29 – W, 2-0 vs. Oklahoma State
- Sept. 3 – W, 1-0 vs. Arkansas
- UT has never opened a season with four consecutive clean sheets.
- Justus is one of just four student-athletes in program history — and the last Texas goalkeeper to record a stretch — with four consecutive clean sheets when she accomplished the feat over a two-week span (Sept. 3 – 14) during the 2023 campaign.
- UT has never opened a season with four consecutive clean sheets.
- A potential brace for Texas forward Trinity Byars would give the senior 50 career goals, becoming the first student-athlete in program history to reach the milestone.
- Baylor's Ashley Merrill (50) is the only active Division I women's soccer student-athlete to currently have scored 50-or-more goals.
- Merrill, however, achieved the feat in 76 career matches, while Byars is two shy of the 50-goal mark having played in eight fewer matches than Merrill.
- Baylor's Ashley Merrill (50) is the only active Division I women's soccer student-athlete to currently have scored 50-or-more goals.
FOLLOW US
- For the latest information on the team, follow @TexasSoccer on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. General athletic news can also be found at @TexasLonghorns on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
