Sept. 11, 2012

Friday, Sept. 14
4 p.m. - No. 15 Cal (5-2-0) vs. Penn (2-2-0)
Edwards Stadium - Berkeley
Coverage: Pac-12 Networks, Twitter, GameTracker
All-Time Record vs. Penn - 2-0
Last Meeting With Penn - W 2-0 (9/17/04)

BERKELEY - The No. 17 California women's soccer team returns home to host Penn on Sept. 14 at 4 p.m. in a game that will be broadcast on the Pac-12 Networks. The Golden Bears have won each of the too all-time meetings with the Quakers - a 4-2 victory on Sept. 27, 2002, and most recently, a 2-0 win on Sept. 17, 2004. At 5-2-0, Cal brings a three-game winning streak into Friday's match while the Quakers (2-2) won their first two games and have dropped their last two games. The Bears are currently tied for 21st in the country with Mississippi State in scoring with 2.71 goals per game.

Cal Leads Pac-12 in Scoring
With 19 goals seven games into the season, Cal sits atop the conference leader board. Stanford is quickly gaining on Cal with 17 goals, which ranks the Cardinal first in goals per game at 2.83. Cal leads the Pac-12 in shots with 128, averaging 18.29 per game. The Bears are in second in points per game, averaging 7.43. Cal is second in points with 52, just one shy of first-place Stanford's 53. Cal paces the Pac-12 in corners with 53 (7.57 per game), which is 11 more than second-place Arizona State's 42.

Battung Named Muscle Milk Student-Athlete of the Week
Senior forward Lauren Battung scored the game-winning goal in the second overtime period to lead the California women's soccer team to a 2-1 win over UC Davis, making her this week's California Muscle Milk Student-Athlete of the Week. After battling injury for months and not returning to her starting role on the Cal women's soccer team, Battung picked and opportune time to score her first goal of the season. With her Bears knotted 1-1 with UC Davis on Friday evening on the Aggie's home turf in the second overtime period, Battung notched the game-winning goal to send the Bears back to Berkeley with a 2-1 double-overtime victory. Cal now owns a three-game winning streak to stand at 5-2.

McGuire Takes Over Second Place
With 12 victories last season and five this year, head coach Neil McGuire now has 62 career wins in his six seasons with the Golden Bears. Last year, McGuire's victory against USC on Oct. 9, 2011 moved him past Andy Bonchonsky (1991-96) and into third place on the school's all-time coaching victories list. With the win over UC Davis on Sept. 7 to bring his Cal career total to 62, McGuire is now the sole owner of second place. McGuire displaces Bill Merrell, who posted a 61-20-8 record from 1983-85.

Baker to Face Old School
Associate head coach Patrick Baker will be coaching against a familiar school in Penn. Following his coaching success at Wesleyan, Baker made the jump to Division I in 1994, when he became the head women's soccer coach at the University of Pennsylvania. Over the next five years, Baker compiled a 42-37-5 record at the Quaker helm.

Last Week on the Pitch
Playing in their first overtime game of the year, Cal came out on top - defeating UC Davis 2-1 in double overtime on Sept. 7. With the game knotted 1-1 after more than 55 minutes of scoreless play, Lauren Battung picked a perfect time to score her first goal of the year - notching the gamewinner at 102:25. Cal handed the Aggies their first defeat of the season, dropping UCD to 3-1-1 while the Bears improve to 5-2-0. The Bears struck first with a goal in the 33rd, when Mekenna DeBack scored her second header in as many games, bringing her season goal total to two. The Aggies responded roughly 10 minutes later after Hannah Hicks collected a rebound on a Cal block to knot things 1-1. Battung scored in the 103rd minute. Emily Kruger performed exceptionally well in goal, making six saves with one of those coming in the second OT period. The Bears forced UC Davis keeper Taylor Jern to make one save while she allowed the two goals.

Aggies Hand Bears First Shot Deficit
For the first time all season, Cal was outshot by its opponent in the Sept. 7 game at UC Davis. At the end of regulation, UC Davis was outshooting Cal 14-9. The Bears had come into Friday's match-up outshooting the opposition 116-44 and had never been outshot in the previous six games. In the most recent game, the Bears limited USF to just one shot while firing off 17 of their own. Davis ended up outshooting Cal 17-12 in the game with the Bears taking the key two shots in the second overtime period to UCD's one. Cal tallied six corner kicks to UC Davis' four.

Bears Limit USF to One Shot
Cal came into the Sept. 2 game against San Francisco taking 19.8 shots per game to their opponents 8.6, but they took that one step further. Cal limited the Dons to just one shot in 90 minutes with the Bears firing off 17 shots. USF's lone shot came in the first half, when the Bears tallied 13. Two of Cal's four second-half shots resulted in goals.

In the Rankings
In the Top Drawer Soccer poll, Cal moves from No. 17 to No. 15. The Bears were also ranked No. 15 after the first week of play in the TDS rankings. Cal is unranked in NSCAA and Soccer America while the Soccer Times poll has not yet been updated. Penn is unranked in all three available polls.

Next Week on the Pitch
The Bears being Pac-12 play by hosting Arizona on Friday, Sept. 21 at 2 p.m. in a Pac-12 Networks broadcast. It's a quick turnaround for the final nonconference game of the year - a Sept. 23 game at 1 p.m. at Nevada.