BEAUMONT, Texas - While their five consecutive shutout streak came to an end, Lamar University's soccer team were able to extend their winning streak to six as they put up three first half goals en route to a 4-1 win over Houston Christian. LU is 2-0 in Southland Conference play and 7-2-1 overall.

LU outshot HCU 14-11 and had four goal scorers including three first time scorers this season in Alana Clark, Arely Alaniz, and Kamryn Harvey. Isela Ramirez would tally her third goal of the season while Hollie Massey picked up three assists and Rafiatu Alhassan had one. Nicole Panis made three saves in goal for LU. 

It only took nearly eight minutes before Alana Clark struck the first goal off a corner kick for her first of the season. Four minutes later, Massey found Alaniz, who from long range, struck the left side of the net to extend LU's lead to 2-0. Massey would later find Ramirez, who trickled one past the keeper for the third goal in the first half. This was the second time this season LU scored three times in the first half and the third time LU scored that many goals in one half. 

The Cardinals made it 4-0 when freshmen Harvey scored her first collegiate goal in the 75th minute. But after 557 minutes and 50 seconds dating back to the second half against South Alabama, the Cardinals conceded a goal to HCU's Katie Marker. Still, LU prevented more scoring chances as they would finish the night 4-1 victors. 

"Obviously, I am thrilled with the win at home," said head coach Nathan Kogut. "We challenged them this week to send a message and start the game off on the front foot, which I feel that we did.  We scored some great goals and got a lot of kids minutes in conference, something will pay off later this season. It's great to get a good performance in front of our fans over a really good HCU team before taking a couple days off to give the team a chance to recover."

With only one game this weekend, LU now gets set to prepare for a two-game road trip to Louisiana next weekend. First up will be Nicholls at 7 p.m., next Friday night in Thibodaux. 
 

#WeAreLU