It was home sweet home for the Lady Bears in Thursday night’s home opener as they recorded eight goals including two from freshman Caroline Barcelona in an 8-0 shutout win over Tougaloo. The victory also marked the first in the head coaching career of Nicole Daigle Cooper.

“Honestly I’m just excited to get the W, this is what the girls needed,” Cooper said. “We head into a very competitive conference. We have had a lot of good competition leading into this game. We have not played anybody in our division yet and we are just trying to get that preparation.”

The scoring frenzy for the Lady Bears (1-1) started five minutes in when a Hannah Case corner kick was knocked in by Kayla Martin, giving Southwest an early 1-0 edge. A little over two minutes later, the hosts notched their second score of the evening when Barcelona scored the first of her pair.

“The things that we were were applying in practice were really coming out on the field,” she said. “It is never a dull moment when you get two goals.”

After multiple attempts to grow the lead late in the first half, the Lady Bears broke through as Juliette Charriez Rivera got past her defender before rocketing a ball past the Lady Bulldog goalkeeper making the score 3-0.

Barcelona notched her second score 6 minutes into the second half before goals from Maylee McLeod, Mary Claire McCurley, Jennifer Neal and Aoife Saunders rounded-out the scoring. Saunders assisted on the Neal goal while Charriez Rivera assisted on McCurley’s.

The Lady Bears return to action Monday at 5:00 as they visit Mississippi Valley State.