Podojil, Arkansas blank No. 24 BYU

Arkansas' Anna Podojil celebrates with teammates after scoring a goal in the Razorbacks' 2-0 victory over No. 24 BYU on Aug. 30, 2021, in Fayetteville.

FAYETTEVILLE — There’s certainly no place like home for the University of Arkansas soccer team.

The Razorbacks got two goals from junior forward Anna Podojil paired with an outstanding defensive effort to claim a 2-0 win over No. 24 Brigham Young in front of a vocal crowd of 2,370 on Monday night at Razorback Field.

Arkansas coach Colby Hale was all smiles following the win, wiping out the Razorbacks’ 0-2 start to the season.

“I thought it was gritty. It was tough,” Hale said. “BYU’s a very good team. They have some of the best players in the country. It was pretty open. We found a way to win.

‘I thought our defense was very, very good. Our defending was terrific in and around the box. We talk about winning the boxes and we won the boxes tonight.”

Arkansas (1-2) took the lead in the fourth minute on an unusual play. The BYU defender played the ball back toward their own goal, but the Cougars keeper played it with her hands illegally to keep it from going into her own goal resulting in an indirect free kick.

The Razorbacks caught BYU a little off-guard as Jessica De Filippo flipped a pass to Podojil, who hammered a shot in the back of net.

Hale credited his players for coming together on the wild play and dealing with something they hadn’t even practiced

“Crazy play. And I didn’t think he called it,” Hale said. “We’ve not worked on that. The players did that, so that’s fantastic.”

Podojil agreed.

“Honestly, it was so unexpected,” Podojil said. “I think we kinda set it up to where they thought Parker (Goins) was going to smash it. They played it over to me as they were shifting we found the back of the net.

“It was a well set up play by Jess and Parker.”

Podojil added a second goal off a nice feed from Goins in the 54th minute to give Arkansas the 2-0 advantage.

Hale said it was obviously a big play.

“Huge, it was a huge play,” Hale said. “And we coulda had a few more. I thought the game went as we hoped and I’m proud of them.”

Following the second goal, Arkansas turned up the defense keeping the Cougars off the board to notch the shutout.

The Razorbacks improved to 9-4 all-time at Razorback Field against ranked opponents.

Hale acknowledged the win was important even though the Razorbacks have played one of the toughest schedules in the country thus far, facing three nationally ranked teams in the first three matches — including two losses to teams ranked in the top 5.

“It was important, I mean no one’s started with as tough a schedule as us,” Hale said. “We know who we are and we fought well.”

Both Hale and Podojil credited the vocal crowd with helping the team to the win after back-to-back losses to start the season.

“How awesome was the environment?” Hale said. “We’ve grown. We’ve played more games and you’ve got the fans. It was unbelievable and they’re a big part of that.”

“The fans were like a 12th man tonight and that was incredible,” Podojil added. “I think we just played as a team, grinded out as a team. It wasn’t an individual effort. We worked together and put together two good 45s.”

Arkansas continues nonconference play on Sunday, hosting Stephen F. Austin at noon.