Recap: No.7 Stanford Women’s Soccer drops 7 on San Francisco


On Thursday, No. 7 Stanford women’s soccer defeated San Francisco at Cagan Stadium by a final score of 7-0. Stanford senior Jasmine Aikey (25:43 & 55:31) and freshman Brooke Holden (81:11 & 86:52) each had a brace, scoring two goals in the match. Stanford freshman Caroline Birkel got the start in the net for the Cardinal at goalkeeper, playing the first half while sophomore Kaiya Jota played the second half. Stanford improves to 1-0 on the season while San Francisco falls to 0-1. 

BOX SCORE: Stanford vs. San Francisco-Thursday, August 14th

“Yeah, great opening game for us,” Stanford head coach Paul Ratcliffe said after the match. “A lot of goals. I got, a lot of players got playing time, and it was a really fun atmosphere. So, couldn’t be more pleased with the team’s first performance.” 

This one was one-way traffic for the Cardinal from the jump. At the 4:38 mark, less than five minutes into the match, senior Allie Montoya scored the first goal of the season for the Cardinal off an assist from Andrea Kitahata and Charlotte Kohler. The next goal came from Aikey at 25:43 off an assist from Elise Evans, Aikey finding the bottom right of the goal off her left foot. That made it 2-0. 

Stanford wasn’t done scoring goals in the half as freshman Y-Lan Nguyen scored the first goal of her Cardinal career, finding the bottom left of the goal off her right foot thanks to another assist from Evans. Stanford wouldn’t score the rest of the half, making it a 3-0 lead at halftime. The Cardinal were in firm control. 

In the second half, rather than taking their foot off the gas, Stanford scored four more goals. Aikey scored at 55:31, finding the bottom left of the goal off her right foot thanks to an assist from Shae Harvey and then at 68:41, Jaden Thomas found the top left of the goal off her right foot courtesy of an assist from Logan Smith. It was now a 5-0 lead for the Cardinal.

Rather than being content with a 5-0 victory, Stanford added two more goals thanks to Holden, who scored at 81:11 off an assist from Ava Harrison and again at 86:52 off an assist from Milly Bray. 7-0 ended up being the final score as Stanford poured it on for the full 90 minutes. 

“Yeah, Brooke’s a goal scorer,” Ratcliffe said of Holden. “When we recruited her, we knew what we were getting. She’s a great goal scorer. She’s worked really hard through preseason camp, done exceptionally well, and she scored two really classy goals I thought.” 

For Stanford, this was a great way to start off the season. They not only scored a lot of goals, but they also outshot San Francisco 30-4, maintaining a 7-3 advantage in corner kicks as well. Just an all-around dominant outing. 

“Yeah, we have to capitalize,” Ratcliffe said. “I mean, last year I can, so many games we’d have 30 shots and maybe one goal. And tonight, I don’t know how many shots we had, but we’re scoring seven, is impressive. That’s much better strike rate. That’s what we’re looking for.” 

“Yeah, we had a plan coming in and that were going to blow the team out,” Aikey said. “So, we reached our team goals. Obviously, I’m glad I could get some on the score sheet for the team, but really just overall performance is so happy and proud. 

“I mean, I think that goes back to last season. We made it to the final four, but realistically, like we wanted our performances, we needed to be more ruthless and that’s something that we’ve just tried to carry over. So even the first two weeks of preseason, we were like one goal is not good enough. Two goals isn’t good enough. Three goals isn’t good enough. And that’s just something that we’ve been doing all week and it’s just kind of bled in.” 

Having Jasmine Aikey back out there was great for the Cardinal after the way her season ended last season due to injury. She was happy to be on the pitch again and playing at her regular position, which is midfielder. Last year, she had to play on the backline due to a need, but she’s glad she’s in a better position to do what she does best, which is score goals. 

“Oh my gosh, it feels amazing just to be back with my teammates,” Aikey said with a smile. “I mean, I put in a lot of work this offseason. We all did, but especially, like me, just struggling to come back. This feels like all my hard work has paid off and I’m just so happy.

“Yeah, I mean, I feel like I can play a couple different positions. Pretty much up the middle, but I feel like my attacking creativity and that’s kind of something I bring, I think that’s better than my defending. So I’m happy to be able to contribute more to the team in that way for sure.” 

“She’s incredible,” Ratcliffe said of Aikey. “Jazzy’s worked really hard in the offseason. She’s built up her fitness and then you see the ability she has. She scored like two world class goals tonight.” 

As for the goalkeeper position, Stanford elected to roll with true freshman Caroline Birkel for the first 45 minutes. During the preseason, she’s done a great job, earning the starting position. It’ll be interesting to see if she’ll continue to hang onto that spot as the season goes along. 

“Yeah, it was a hard decision,” Ratcliffe said of figuring out who to start. “Caroline, Kaiya, and Alyssa have been tremendous in preseason. Caroline separated herself a little bit and we put her there, but I thought Kaiya was outstanding, too in goal. And Alyssa is gonna do very well for us as well. So, I think it’s, we have a competitive fight for minutes with the goalkeepers.” 

Up next for Stanford is another home match against No. 16 Santa Clara on Sunday. That will begin at 1:00 PM PT on ACCNX. 

“Yeah, it’s always a test,” Ratcliffe said of facing the Broncos. “Santa Clara has a solid team and they do a great job and they know us very well. So I expect a playoff type atmosphere game with the crowd because it’s a rivalry close proximity to us. But it’s always a great game and a game that we’ll grow from and learn from. So we’re excited.” 

“Yeah, I mean, they’re a good team,” Aikey added. “They’re pretty much our biggest rivals. We’re gonna need to make it a soccer game, but we’re just gonna fight as hard as we can and that’s the mentality we’ve been working towards all season and I’m excited for all the freshmen to have their first Santa Clara game.” 

CardinalSportsReport.com on Facebook, IG, Threads, X (Twitter), & Bluesky: @StanfordRivals 

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