Broncos Win Big One, 34-23 Over Utah State

Boise State took a major step towards a berth in the first Mountain West Conference Championship game with a 34-23 win on the road against Utah State.

The Broncos are now 4-2 on the season with their 49th consecutive win in the month of October.

Bronco Swim Team On Top At Bulldog Invitational

It was a good first day for the Boise State swimming team, as the Broncos set the pace at the Fresno State Bulldog Invitational with 353.5 points.  San Jose State is a distant second with 229 points.

The Bronco 200-yard medley relay team stunned California to set the pool and meet record that the Golden Bears set last year.  Boise State finished in 1:43.15, topping Cal's 1:45.97.  

Felicity Cann captured the 500-yard freestyle in 4:56.52, with teammate Taylor Padington taking second (4:59.50.  Junior Jessical Bottelberghe led a Bronco sweep in the 200 IM, with Sydney Johansen taking second and freshman Whitney Jorgensen touching for third place.

"Going 1-2-3 in the 200 IM was fun for the team," said head coach Kristin Hill. "And all of our 200 IM swimmers set new individual dual meet records.  Ciera Cortney's score was even higher than last week and was the second highest all time score for a Bronco.  Brittany Aoyama'slead off time in the 800 freestyle relay was very strong. We had some fast 50 freestyles and most were faster than last weekend which is a great sign considering the heavy training we put in this week, as well as a big travel day yesterday. This is a very strong, resilient team that loves to race and that showed today."

Ayoma won the 50-yard freestyle in 23.61.  The Invitational continues with action today in Fresno.

Bronco Soccer Team Blanks San Jose State 3-0

Don't look now, but the Boise State soccer team is a contender.

The Lady Broncos shut down San Jose State 3-0, as junior Maddy McDevitt earned her sixth shutout of the season.  In the fifth minute, Gabby Garcia broke in the clear along the left flank, and netted a shot to put Boise State up 1-0.  Kayla Tucker followed suit fifteen minutes later and Katy Oehring scored her second goal of the season in the 78th minute of play.  

The Bronco defense was superb, holding the Spartans to just two shots and one on goal.

"I think one of the things that we trained on this week was not just good soccer, if we're going to compete in a tournament, either the Mountain West or the NCAA, we have to have a little more killer instinct about us," said head coach Jim Thomas.

"And I think that's what our team came out with. They came out with the mentality that every single moment counted. They got one goal, instantly got the second goal and they were hunting for the third goal for the rest of the half. And that kept us in so much control of that game because we were in that competitive mentality, not settling for two goals but still hunting for the third. We had a little slow start in the second half but the team got back up to that first half rhythm relatively quickly, and again found that third goal and put the game to bed. So it was really proud of them to take that mentality that will promote us to good conference games and good tournament games as well."

Boise State is now 3-1 in Mountain West Conference play and 8-4-2 on the year.  Coach Thomas's team remains tied with New Mexico for second in the league.  The Broncos travel to Fresno State to try to continue the momentum.