Arizona will face off the Brigham Young Cougars on Friday, Sept. 15 to wrap up their non-conference play. Both Arizona and BYU are fresh off momentum swinging wins with the Wildcats beat Texas Tech 1-0, and the Cougars beat Oregon State 3-0 on Monday.

The Wildcats are coming off their first home win scoring their only goal on a header from a corner despite firing off 18 shots. Texas Tech played a very conservative style of defense, and were forced to because of how high Arizona pressed on defense.

Arizona will be going face-to-face against BYU, which is a bigger competitor for the ‘Cats. The Cougars currently hold a disappointing 1-3-3 record, but have played some of the best teams in the country. While Texas Tech wasn’t able to break Arizona’s press, BYU should have the talent to mount offensive attacks, which will open the field greatly. 

Offensively, Arizona is continuing play strong, but head coach Tony Amato is still looking to be able to score within the box after only scoring one goal after they shot the ball 32 times.

“Right now it looks good until the 18 yard box. If we can get inside the box and be dangerous, which we’re working on now, we could be pretty good,” Amato said. 

The Wildcats are looking to be able to score off crosses from the wings, especially with leading scorer Gabi Stoian going day-by-day with a hamstring strain. Stoian has scored a pair of goals off of senior midfielder Cali Crisler. Arizona has also been able to combine at the top of the box, but have been unable to create chances off those combinations. 

The ‘Cats will have to create scoring chances while possessing the ball in order to compete with Cougars and with their first Pac-12 game against Oregon.

BYU is coming off a 3-0 win at Oregon State making it their first win of the season. The Cougars are well versed in Pac-12 soccer at this point in the season having played UCLA, Colorado, Utah and Oregon State. 

The Wildcats and Cougars will kickoff the game on Friday at 7 p.m. at Mulcahy Stadium and will be broadcast on Pac-12 Networks.

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