Chelsea Peterson saved the penalty. BYU still lost the game three seconds later.
Wisconsin’s Erin Connolly took the 80th-minute kick, Peterson stopped it, and defender Hailey Baumann reached the rebound for the only goal in a 1-0 Badgers win Wednesday night. It is a cruel sequence for a goalkeeper and an easy one for the rest of us to reduce to one whistle.
The full box score says the trouble started earlier. BYU outshot Wisconsin 12-9 and put four attempts on target, but the Cougars lost the second-half corner count 4-1 and did not make goalkeeper Drew Stover work after the 51st minute. Wisconsin kept earning restarts until one finally became the deciding play.
That does not make the penalty irrelevant. It makes the loss more useful than a 10-second replay.
Peterson did the hard part of the penalty sequence
The official play-by-play puts the sequence into three seconds. Peterson received a yellow card at 79:24. Connolly’s penalty was saved at the same timestamp. Baumann scored at 79:27.
No public source provides a useful camera angle or referee explanation that would justify retrying the collision in print. BYU’s account says Peterson collided with a Wisconsin forward. Wisconsin’s account says the penalty followed a corner and a physical play in the box. The penalty was called, and Peterson faced it.
She made the save.
That matters when assigning responsibility. Peterson did not simply guess wrong and watch the ball hit the side netting. She kept out Connolly, Wisconsin’s leading returning scorer, and forced the Badgers to win the next action. Baumann did exactly that.
A saved penalty is not a dead ball. The goalkeeper can knock it away, hold it or leave a rebound in play, but defenders and attackers still have jobs until the whistle. The available record does not identify every player’s position around the box, so pinning the rebound on one Cougar would be fake precision. It does show Wisconsin reached the loose ball first.
The field changed after halftime
BYU had the better first half by the clearest public measures. The Cougars took seven shots to Wisconsin’s three, put two on frame to the Badgers’ one and matched Wisconsin with three corners. Bella Woods forced both of Drew Stover’s first-half saves. Wisconsin also had an apparent goal erased for offside after Anya Gulbrandsen hit the crossbar.
The second half went the other direction.
| Match receipt | BYU | Wisconsin |
|---|---|---|
| Shots | 12 | 9 |
| Shots on goal | 4 | 3 |
| First-half shots | 7 | 3 |
| Second-half shots | 5 | 6 |
| Corners | 4 | 7 |
| Second-half corners | 1 | 4 |
| Saves | 2 | 4 |
Ellie Walbruch put two shots on goal in the 50th and 51st minutes. Sophie Sivulich hit the crossbar in the 56th. From there, BYU’s only recorded attempts were a blocked Mika Krommenhoek shot in the 63rd and Brynnli Tolbert’s shot over the bar in the 87th.
Wisconsin did not batter Peterson with a dozen saves. The Badgers finished with three shots on target. Their pressure showed up in location and repetition instead: consecutive corners in the 71st and 72nd minutes, another in the 80th, then a seventh corner after taking the lead.
BYU’s watch guide for Wisconsin identified the second action after corners and blocked service as the match’s best viewing cue. That was not fortune-telling. Wisconsin had taken nine corners against TCU in its opener, while BYU’s winner at UCLA came from staying active after a free kick hit the post. Wednesday supplied the unhappy version for the Cougars. Wisconsin kept the ball near BYU’s box long enough for a restart, penalty and rebound to become one sequence.
Shot volume hid a finishing problem
A 12-9 advantage is not empty. BYU created enough attempts to avoid calling this an attacking collapse. The distribution still needs attention before Saturday’s home opener.
Woods, a defender, supplied BYU’s two first-half shots on goal. Walbruch supplied the two after halftime. No other Cougar put an attempt on frame. Tolbert led BYU with three shots, but all three were blocked or off target. Krommenhoek took two without testing Stover.
The contrast with the 2-1 win at UCLA is sharp. BYU put seven of 14 shots on target in Los Angeles and scored through two different players. Against Wisconsin, the Cougars again generated a dozen attempts, but only one-third reached the goalkeeper and none became a dangerous second ball inside the six-yard box.
Stover deserves her four-save shutout. BYU also made the last 39 minutes easier on her than the shot total suggests.
This is where the loss can produce a better correction than panic about the No. 9 ranking. BYU did not stop finding the attacking third. It stopped turning that territory into shots Stover had to solve. More shots from Tolbert and Krommenhoek are encouraging only if the next batch forces a save, rebound or corner.
Tolbert’s role grew even without another goal
Tolbert was BYU’s first substitute, entering in the 16th minute, and played 55 minutes. She led the team in attempts one week after scoring the winner in her college debut at UCLA.
The freshman did not finish this time. That should stay in the record beside the useful part: Jennifer Rockwood trusted her early, brought her back for the final stretch and kept finding her in shooting positions. Tolbert has moved from preseason possibility to a regular part of the first two road matches without needing anyone to declare a permanent starting job.
The finishing burden was spread less evenly. Walbruch recorded both second-half shots on goal. Woods recorded both in the first. BYU used seven substitutes, but the bench did not produce a shot on target.
That is a better question for USC than whether Tolbert starts: can BYU get on-frame work from a third player before the match reaches its final 10 minutes?
USC arrives before the lesson gets comfortable
BYU returns to South Field at 1-1 for its home opener against USC on Saturday, Aug. 22, at 7 p.m. Mountain. The official BYU recap lists ESPN+ as the stream.
The Cougars do not need to throw away the road trip. Beating UCLA and losing by one late rebound at Wisconsin is a credible opening pair. They also should not hide behind the combined 26-19 shot advantage from those games.
At UCLA, BYU’s pressure created goals from a turnover and a loose ball after a set piece. At Wisconsin, the Cougars went almost 40 minutes without putting a shot on goal and let the Badgers own the late corner count. Peterson rescued the first kick of the decisive play. Nobody rescued the rebound.
Saturday’s correction is plain: make the goalkeeper work after halftime, and finish the second action before USC does.
Sources and further reading
- BYU Athletics, Aug. 19: Cougs fall 1-0 at Wisconsin for BYU’s official match account, penalty sequence, player shot leaders and USC date, time and stream.
- Wisconsin Athletics, Aug. 19: Badgers upset No. 9 BYU, 1-0 for the independent match account, Baumann rebound, Stover shutout and late-match sequence.
- Wisconsin Athletics: official BYU-Wisconsin box score for the 12-9 shot count, 4-3 shots-on-goal line, 7-4 corner count, halves, minutes and complete play-by-play. Wisconsin’s recap prose lists eight Badgers shots; this article uses the official box score’s nine.
- Official BYU Athletics API: women’s soccer schedule, event 25199 and schedule ID 1624 for the completed status, 0-1 result, Madison venue and official post-event article ID.
- BYU Sport Nuts: Wisconsin watch guide, UCLA recap, women’s soccer hub, roster and schedule.
