Soccer: Utah State Topples Boise State, Returns To NCAA Tournament

BOISE – When the Aggies and Broncos couldn’t decide a victor in regulation, the teams took to overtime. When two rounds of that didn’t work, the Mountain West Championship game went into penalty kicks. That’s when Utah State finally emerged, battle-tested and triumphant, to earn a three-peat in its final year in the Mountain West Conference.

It’s the third year in a row that the Aggies topped the Broncos in the tournament, and the second in a row that took place in the title game.

In a championship game staffed by two elite defenses, offense was hard to come by – until it wasn’t. Utah State kept Boise State from taking a single shot on goal in the entire first half. Utah State had one shot on frame, but it was one of only two total shots in the half for the Aggies.

The stalemate continued until the 48th minute, when Summer Diamond hit a left-footer into the net off an assist from Kaylie Chambers. Once Diamond disrupted the gridlock, offense started to flow. In the 63rd minute, Rine Yonaha was awarded a penalty kick and went head-to-head with the Defensive Player and Newcomer of the Year in the MWC, keeper Ava de Leest. She surveyed the net and took a running start at the ball. When she arrived, de Leest guessed wrong while Yonaha delivered some insurance into the bottom right corner of the net. The Aggies led 2-0 and enjoyed that lead for about 10 minutes. As time ticked away, the ground beneath the Broncos continued to shrink.

The teams entered the 74th minute with a two-point difference. With just over 15 minutes to play, it was a lot of distance for Boise State to cover. It seemed like it would be too much, and it nearly was. But the Broncos broke through on a PK of their own when a handball sent Olivia Collins to the dot.

Utah State was left to defend its one-goal lead and coax the clock to 90. It did so successfully for a few minutes, and with the 80-minute mark approaching, the Aggies would only need to hang on for 10 more minutes to take the crown. Boise State’s back-against-the-wall attack against Utah State and the clock paid off just a few minutes later, when Kayla Sonderstrom punched in a game-tying goal in the 79th minute.

Suddenly, the Aggies, without any insurance, were on their back foot and had to score to retake the lead or to defend that same 10-minute time frame just to survive. The Broncos didn’t deliver a shot on goal until the 57th minute and trailed 2-0 up until the 74th, yet in the final 15 minutes of regulation, they scored twice to force what would end up being 110 minutes of play without a champion.

Once regulation ended, so did the scoring flurry that accompanied it, and offense became scarce once more. In the first overtime period, both teams took just one shot. Nothing was on goal, nothing found the net, and the teams went into a second overtime period. This time, the Aggies didn’t get a single shot off, but Boise State did. The Broncos took three shots off in the 10-minute overtime, and two of them were on target, forcing Allee Grashoff to record two do-or-die saves.

Her heroics kept the Aggies alive, but they also put the most vaunted defensive player in the conference in the spotlight. For 110 minutes of grueling soccer, Utah State had earned a penalty kick shootout against Boise State’s reliable backstop, de Leest.

In response, head coach Manny Martins made a gutsy call. He went to the bullpen and brought in Taylor Rath. Although it would add some storybook flair to the already dramatic story, to call Rath a second-string keeper would be a bit of a prevarication. She started her fair share of games, including Utah State’s regular season finale, and was named to the all-Mountain West second-team and all-newcomer team.

Still, it was a bold call to go to a sub when Grashoff hadn't allowed a goal in the first two games of the tournament, and had just picked up two overtime stops. Rath hadn’t played at all throughout the entire tournament, and Martins now turned to her and put Utah State’s season in her gloved hands.

Boise State got the first one by Rath when Collins hit her attempt to even the score after Yonaha hit the top left corner on her strike. Rachel Reitz found the net and Rath stuffed Jillian Anderson to give Utah State a massive 2-1 edge after the second round of PKs.

Talia Winder’s kick was good and Madie Donovan matched. Chambers kept the Aggies perfect from the dot when she sailed one over de Leest to take a 4-2 lead and pin the Broncos down with no room for error.

Cindy Conner stepped up with a chance to force a fifth and final round of kicks. Rath read Conner’s approach and shifted to her left before the kick was off. Conner left it on the ground, aimed for the right half of the goal. Rath dove on the ground, and Boise State’s season met her white gloves. She gathered the ball and sent it away with a celebratory drop kick as she ran to her team, which was now rushing to greet her as a hero and Mountain West Champion.

Rath had come off the bench and gone toe-to-toe with de Leest with the season on the line. She came out on top. Taking them one by one, Rath beat two of the four Broncos she faced while Utah State’s PK lineup put together a perfect slate, beating de Leest four times out of four.

Rath, with help from Yonaha, Reitz, Winder, and Chambers, gave Utah State its first penalty kick shootout win since 2013, when it topped New Mexico 4-2 in the Mountain West Tournament.

It was the last time these two teams would meet as members of the Mountain West, and it dragged on for about as long as it could. Utah State’s tournament run was an unlikely one, at least, as unlikely as it can be for a team coached by Martins. The Aggies with hang a banner without a first-round bye, reserved for the top three seeds, and were the first team to win the tournament as a 3-seed or lower since San Jose State in 2018.

Utah State’s three-peat was also unlikely. Utah State is just the third team in Mountain West history to win three-straight league tournaments, and the first to do so since San Diego State did it from 2012 to 2014. This is Utah State's third Mountain West tournament title and fifth league crown overall, with back-to-back wins in the WAC in 2011 and 2012. It is also the fifth time the program has clinched a spot in the NCAA tournament.

That tournament berth yielded a familiar harvest. On Monday, it was announced that Utah State’s tournament ticket will be sending them to Provo to take on BYU. The Aggies and Cougars previously met in the tournament in 2012 and 2023. Utah State fell to BYU earlier this year, but under Martins, the Aggies are 3-2-1 against their in-state foe.