The University of Florida soccer team (14-5-5, 7-1-3 SEC) advances to the NCAA Round of 16 after taking a 4-3 penalty kicks advantage over Marquette University (12-6-5, 7-3-1 Big EAST) in NCAA Championship second round action at the Marquette University Valley Fields. The two teams played to a scoreless tie, forcing penalty kicks to determine the advancing team. Florida now moves to the NCAA Round of 16 and will meet regional No. 2 seed UCLA, which was a 3-1 winner over Cal State Fullerton on Sunday.

This will be Florida’s sixth NCAA Round of 16 appearance and its first since 2003.

After 110 minutes of scoreless play, the match moved to penalty kicks. The format requires five players from each team to take a shot from the penalty mark. The leader after five shots is determined the advancing team. The five players Florida sent to the line were (in shooting order) KeLeigh Hudson, Ananda O’Neal, Stacy Bishop, Ameera Abdullah and Ansley Myrick. The first pair hit their penalty kicks, but MU’s second shooter, Michelle Martin, missed her shot. O’Neal gave UF a 2-1 advantage by successfully hitting her shot. MU’s Allison Mallams tied the score up at 2-all, which held up when MU goalkeeper Laura Boyer made a save on Bishop’s shot.

The fourth pair of shooters, MU’s Meghan Connelly and UF’s Abdullah, each hit their shots. Gator goalkeeper Brittni Goodwin used what a teammate later referred to as a “Matrix save” to keep the shot by MU’s final shooter out of the goal.

“Her body was telling me that she was going to my left, but she ended up going to my right,” Goodwin said. “So I dived and I kind of kicked my foot out.”

So the focus then turned to Myrick, a senior player who has seen little action this season due to an early season knee injury. She quickly struck the ball after the official gave the signal and her strike ended up in the lower right corner of the net.

Myrick said her key to penalty kick success is not to over think the situation.

“To be honest, as far as PKs go, I just try my best not to think. I don’t even look at the goal because I don’t want to give the keeper a chance to try and read me,” Myrick said. “As soon as he (the referee) blew the whistle, I took it.”

Many thoughts and emotions rushed though Myrick when she saw the goal bounced into the net.

“I was just really excited that we advanced and the season’s not over and we get to play next weekend,” Myrick continued. “I kind of remember seeing it go in and then turning around to see my teammates. They were all around celebrating right afterwards. We were all so excited!”

Three Gator seniors played a part in Florida’s penalty kicks, including Myrick and O’Neal who were making their first appearance of the match. UF Head Coach Becky Burleigh commented on how key their performances were in this situation.

“Some of our seniors really stepped up big, some kids that didn’t even play in the game,” Burleigh said. “But we work on penalty kicks all the time and they have made them in practice so I felt confident they would make them here.

“I’ve always thought that your goalkeeper needs to come up with one big save (in a penalty kick situation) and Brittni did. It was a great save, too. She just threw her whole body there and got a piece of it with her foot to keep it out of the net.”

Sunday’s match was the first time in the program’s 12-year history that the Gators had advanced on penalty kicks. UF had participated in penalty kicks situations twice before, both in the Southeastern Conference Tournament (1995 and 2003).

For a flash, it looked like penalty kicks wouldn’t be necessary. In the final 35 seconds of the final overtime period, it appeared that Gator junior Shelley Lyle had headed in a corner kick served up by Liz Ruberry. Lyle’s far post strike went in at the near post, but it was nullified by a Gator foul on the MU goalkeeper.

Both teams did have other opportunities to score in regulation and in the overtime periods.

In the 78^th minute, Bishop’s shot was not controlled by the MU goalkeeper, but no Gator was in the box to put in the deflection. Bishop also had a 20-yard free kick in the 98^th minute, but Boyer made the diving save at the lower corner of the near post. The Golden Eagles had a 1v1 situation in the 94^th minute when Allison Mallams intercepted a bad touch by a Gator defender, but her shot went wide of the far post.

Florida advances to next weekend’s NCAA Round of 16. The Florida-UCLA match is set for Friday, Nov. 17 at 10 p.m. (ET) and can be heard live on www.GatorZone.com.