Haley McCutcheon Brace Leads Orlando Pride Past Bay FC 3-1 Despite a 28-Shot Barrage

Bay FC took 28 shots on Sunday afternoon. The Orlando Pride took nine. If you only saw the box score, you would assume a home win. Instead, Haley McCutcheon spent the afternoon proving that volume is overrated.

McCutcheon scored 81 seconds into the match and again two minutes into the second half, Cosette Morche made seven saves, and Jacqueline Ovalle sealed it in the sixth minute of stoppage time as Orlando beat Bay FC 3-1 at PayPal Park. Racheal Kundananji's diving header had briefly pulled the hosts level, but Bay could not find a second goal no matter how many times it knocked.

McCutcheon Sets the Tone, Kundananji Answers

The Pride wasted no time. In the second minute, Solai Washington carried the ball into the attack and found McCutcheon on the left side of the box, and McCutcheon lifted a right-footed shot into the top right corner. Orlando's club notes say the goal, timed at 1:21, was the fastest the Pride have scored all season.

Bay responded like a team that took it personally. Taylor Huff had a shot blocked a minute later, Morche saved from Kundananji in the sixth, and Claire Hutton put one wide from a tight angle in the seventh. Then came a frantic stretch in the 10th and 11th minutes in which Kundananji, Jenna Nighswonger and Hutton all had efforts blocked. The pressure paid off from a corner in the 11th minute, when Hutton's cross found Kundananji at the back post and her diving header flew into the top right corner. Per Bay FC, it was her third goal of the season.

The rest of the half belonged mostly to Bay without the reward. Morche stopped Karlie Lema in the 32nd minute after a headed pass from Hannah Bebar, and Alex Pfeiffer in the 36th. Orlando's only real threat was an Oihane Hernández shot that Jordan Silkowitz saved in first-half stoppage time. It was 1-1 at the break.

The Turning Point: Another Fast Start

Halftime team talks are supposed to settle a game. Orlando's settled it in about two minutes. In the 47th minute, Angelina delivered a corner to the back post, and McCutcheon, unmarked, headed in from close range for her second of the afternoon.

That goal flipped the emotional math. Bay still dominated the ball and the shot count, but now it was chasing, and Morche was waiting. She stopped Lema again from outside the box in the 66th minute and saved a Huff header in the 70th. Lema also missed from the left side of the six-yard box in the 62nd, the kind of chance that haunts a coach's film session.

Bay coach Emma Coates threw on Agostina Holzheier, Keira Barry and Caroline Conti, and the late push was real. In the 88th minute alone, Barry and Nighswonger had three shots blocked between them. Holzheier hit the right post in the 90th minute, then had two more shots saved by Morche in stoppage time. Bay needed one bounce. It never came.

Instead, Orlando delivered the knockout on the break. In the 96th minute, Barbra Banda released Ovalle on a fast break, and Ovalle beat Silkowitz from outside the box with a right-footed shot into the top right corner. Per the Pride, it was Ovalle's third goal of the campaign and Banda's club-leading fourth assist.

Who Stood Out

Haley McCutcheon scored twice on three shots. Orlando says it was the second brace of her career, after her first came against Angel City FC on April 3, and her fifth goal of the season overall.

Cosette Morche made seven saves and was the main reason Bay's 28 shots produced one goal. That is a goalkeeping clinic in a road kit.

Racheal Kundananji led Bay with five shots and scored the equalizer. Agostina Holzheier came off the bench and produced four shots, two on target and one off the post, in just over 20 minutes plus stoppage time.

Kerry Abello came on in the 62nd minute for her 100th NWSL appearance with the Pride. According to the club, she joins Marta and McCutcheon as the only players in club history to reach that mark, and she was in no mood to undersell the result.

"It was a great result, a very gritty win. It wasn't our best performance from start to finish," Abello said. "I'm so proud of and moved by the way that the team rallied around those goals by Haley McCutcheon. She put the team on her back today and it achieved a huge result for us."

Stats That Matter

• Shots: Bay outshot Orlando 28 to nine and put eight on target to the Pride's four.
• Saves: Morche made seven. Silkowitz made one.
• Crosses: Bay attempted 30 crosses, connecting on 10.
• Clearances: Orlando made 36 clearances to Bay's 17.
• Possession: Bay held 54.2 percent of the ball.

What It Means

Orlando moved to 10-3-13 with 33 points and bounced back from a 4-1 home loss to the Portland Thorns. The win also completed a season sweep of Bay, after a 3-1 win in Orlando in May, and the Pride noted they now have 10 wins, one loss and two draws all-time in regular season matches in California, the best such record among NWSL clubs. Next up was a home date with San Diego Wave FC on Oct. 2.

Bay FC fell to 7-5-14 with 26 points, and the club acknowledged the result left it eliminated from playoff contention. Bay's recap framed the remaining schedule as a chance to play spoiler, starting with a trip to the Kansas City Current on Oct. 3.

Closing Take

Bay FC did almost everything a home team is supposed to do except the one thing that counts. Orlando, meanwhile, played like a video game speedrunner: find the shortcut, skip the cutscenes, hit the finish line before anyone else has left the tutorial. Twenty-eight shots will look great on a chart. Three goals look better on a table.

Stats from ESPN's match data. Postgame quotes as reported by the Orlando Pride. Club notes from Bay FC.