The UCF Knights Women’s Soccer team kicked off its 2025 season this week with a pair of victories over American Athletic Conference foes.
The Knights held off UAB in Birmingham on Thursday after a scoreless second half, 2-1, and after a three-and-a-quarter weather delay, dispatched Florida Atlantic late Sunday night, 3-1.
UCF’s victory over the Owls was its first win in Orlando since Sep. 12, 2024, just over 11 months ago, and puts it one win away from tying its total win total from last season.
“I
just feel like we have the start we deserve,” defender Jada Silvest said Sunday night. “We’ve worked so hard, and we have the talent. So, I’m just glad to see that we’re finally producing it.”
Silvest and the backline limited the Blazers and Owls to four and one shots on goal, respectively. Despite allowing one goal to each opponent, they were only scored after the Knights had already gotten out to a multi-goal lead.
“We’ve been getting different players on the field, and that’s just us trying to keep everybody healthy, trying to share minutes, rotate, get everybody confident and ready for any opponent,” head coach Tiffany Roberts Sahaydak said Sunday.
The Worden Is Out
Offensively, four different players scored the Knights’ five goals across both matches. Long Beach State transfer Liz Worden is the only one of them to score multiple goals, both of which are worthy of highlight reels.
Her first, against the Blazers, was an Olympico, or a goal that is scored directly from a corner kick without it hitting any other player.
“She strikes the ball better than I’ve ever seen at any level, so I’m not surprised, actually, that it happened,” Sahaydak said. “So, I’ve challenged her to let that happen again. So, we’ll see if it’s something she could do consistently.”
Her second, an insurance goal against the Owls, came off a long through ball from Silvest, who earned the assist.
“We’ve actually talked about that a lot, like my connection to Liz,” Silvest said. “She is just a great attacking threat. I saw her open up there, so, hit the long ball and then hit her right to goal.”
Eriksen gets right to work
However, this goal was not the one that initially got UCF on the board Sunday night. That honor belongs to freshman Tyra Eriksen. The native Swede, who has “only been here a few weeks,” according to Sahaydak, scored the first goal of her collegiate career with a rebound goal just after a save from the Owls’ goalkeeper.
“It feels great,” Eriksen said. “[Sahaydak] told us before the game that we had to go for the goal and be ready for anything. So I was just like, ready to make that go.”
Sahaydak said that Monday, the first day of classes at UCF, will be a day off for the team after “quite a long preseason.” However, they will be welcoming South Florida, which was picked to finish second in The American, on Thursday at 7 p.m., soon followed by LSU at 7 p.m. on Sunday.
“I feel like we’ve just learned how to play with each other,” Silvest said. “We have a lot of new players, so just getting comfortable and getting our rhythm, I feel like we’ve got that after this game. So, I feel really good going into our next couple matches.”
