AUBURN, Ala. — Thanks to its 10th clean sheet of the season and three second-half goals, No. 8 Auburn soccer picked up three more points in a 3-0 win over Ole Miss Sunday afternoon at the Auburn Soccer Complex.
Senior goalkeeper Maddie Prohaska smashed Auburn’s shutout record with the 34th of her career in the contest. She now stands alone at second in Southeastern Conference history.
“I give the team the credit,” Tigers head coach Karen Hoppa said. “Our goal today was to be better than we were Thursday. I challenged them to play together and play through each other, and they did exactly that. We created some dangerous, high-percentage chances, and it paid off. They were really, really good in that second half.”
With seven points through their first four matches, the Tigers (10-1-1, 2-1-1) posted their best start to SEC play since the 2020 season, when they opened with two wins and two ties for eight points.
Auburn began Sunday’s match with a couple of dangerous looks in the first 45 but could not sneak one past opposing Olympian goalkeeper Shu Ohba. The drought did not last very long, though, as senior Anna Haddock, sophomore Olivia Woodson and senior Becky Contreras struck for three in the match’s final period, marking the first time Auburn has banked three goals in one half of a conference game since beating Alabama 4-2 with three second-half scores in 2017.
The Tigers dominated the stat sheet, matching the Rebels’ three shots with 19 of their own, and nine on goal. The Orange & Blue also created nine corner kicks, its most in seven matches, compared to just two from Ole Miss.
On the defensive end of the ball, Prohaska and the Auburn back line suffocated any hope of an opposing score from whistle to whistle as the Tigers conceded just the three shots all match with only one finding the face of goal.
It was the fewest shots an Auburn squad allowed in a conference game since 2021 when the Tigers gave up two looks in a 2-0 win over Florida.
Ole Miss’ only dangerous opportunity came in the first 10 minutes of the match when Aubrey Mister got a shot off from inside the arc; however, Prohaska made a leaping save to her right to push the ball off the crossbar and to the feet of center back LJ Knox, who quickly cleared it away.
For the rest of the half, Auburn stayed patient and protected the ball to walk into halftime knotted up 0-0. Haddock changed the pace of the match less than three minutes into the second half with her fourth game-winning goal of the season.
Woodson drove to the endline up the right side of the box and cut back to find sophomore Dylan Driver, who pushed the ball off to a wide-open Haddock at the top left shoulder of the 18. Haddock finished the ball on her first touch to give Auburn the only lead it needed.
“The season is long, and you’ll never find success if you stay focused on the past,” Haddock said. “Our focus was to be better today than we were Thursday. We did that with flying colors.”
Auburn found its second score 57 seconds later courtesy of Woodson. A combo from Haddock and Driver in the midfield resulted in a through ball to Woodson, who dribbled to the penalty spot and ripped off a laser of a shot into the left upper 90.
On the play, Haddock picked up the 40th assist of her career. Driver earned her fifth of the season.
“We knew that what we put on the field on Thursday was clearly not our best,” Driver said. “Today was a bounce-back game. We were patient and found the extra pass, and it helped us finish when we needed to, and that gave us a lot of extra confidence going into this next one.”
Contreras put the match away for good in the 81st minute with her fifth goal of the season. The senior intercepted an Ole Miss pass attempt at midfield and dribbled forward before releasing a shot from nearly 30 yards out that beat Ohba and found a home just inside the near post upper 90.
For Contreras, it was the 14th goal of her career and her first this season that was not from a header.
Up next, Auburn hits the road for the Battle of the Tigers as they venture to Baton Rouge, Louisiana for a 7 p.m. CT showdown with LSU on Friday, Oct. 4.