Spartans drop to No. 4 Virginia on the road

Charlottesville, Va.

- The Michigan State women's soccer team dropped its first game of the 2016 campaign to No. 4 Virginia on Thursday night, 3-0.

With the loss in its first road game of the season, the Michigan State Spartans fell to 1-1-1 overall, while No. 4 Virginia improved to an unblemished 3-0-0 on the start of its season.

"We were disappointed overall but we talked at halftime and at the end of the game again about how we have to find a way to grow from it," said head coach Tom Saxton. "We have a lot of young and inexperienced players but hopefully this gives them the fire they need for future games."

Virginia struck first in the 30th minute when Veronica Latsco slipped by the Spartans defenders setting up Alexis Shaffer to bring the score to 1-0. On the sixth corner kick of the half for Virginia, the Cavaliers struck again when Ayan Adu connected with Montana Sutton for the header in the 45th minute.

The Spartans went in to half time break trailing the Cavaliers, 2-0.

"We did do better in the second half but they are a very good team that sort of smothered us and we could not generate much unfortunately," said Saxton.

Virginia wasted no time early in the second half and increased its lead, 3-0, in the 49th minute of action.

Michigan State mounted several attacks throughout the match, but just could not get the ball through Virginia's defense and past the Cavaliers' goalkeeper, Morgan Stearns.

Senior goalkeeper Kaitlyn Collin received the loss, moving her record to 1-1-1. She picked up seven saves in the loss.

"We had some good defensive performances since that is where we spent a lot of our time but unfortunately, offensively we couldn't get much going," said Saxton. "In the second half we kind of shook off our first half and played hard but we overall we lost to a very good team."

The Spartans' next match will also be on the road, next Thursday, Sept. 1. Michigan State will travel to Boulder, Colorado, to face off against Colorado in Prentup Field at 6:30 p.m. ET.

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Players Mentioned

Kaitlyn Collin