Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
- BYU women's soccer lost 3-1 to Kansas impacting their Big 12 hopes.
- Kansas scored three early goals; BYU's Ellie Walbruch scored her 11th season goal.
- BYU is tied for eighth with Arizona State for the conference tournament spot.
PROVO — BYU women's soccer may need some help to qualify for the Big 12 soccer tournament.
Kansas did all of its scoring in the first 25 minutes to hand the Cougars a 3-1 loss in the South Field regular-season finale Thursday night in front of 3,017 fans.
Ellie Walbruch scored her sixth goal in the last four matches for BYU, but the damage was done in dropping the Cougars to 8-5-3 and 3-4-2 in Big 12 play with two matches remaining.
BYU entered Thursday night's match 2 points behind the Jayhawks (11-3-3, 5-3-1 Big 12) for the No. 7 seed in the conference tournament, but ended with a 5-point deficit behind Kansas and UCF, with road matches at the Knights and Utah.
The Cougars are currently in a tie for eighth with Arizona State, which won at Utah 1-0 Thursday night to improve to 3-4-2 in league play. The Sun Devils also beat then-No. 10 BYU 2-1 in the Big 12 opener Sept. 18.
Head-to-head results is the first tiebreaker if two teams are tied on points for the eight-team conference tournament to be held Nov. 3-5 in Fort Worth and Waco, Texas.
Since then, winning just three games in conference play, along with two ties that included Monday's draw with a ranked Colorado side that handed Texas Tech its first loss in Big 12 play 3-0.
"To be honest, I didn't see that coming. There was a lot riding on this game," BYU coach Jennifer Rockwood said. "Kansas has had a fantastic season; we knew that they were physical, we knew they were fast, aggressive and press hard. And they just came ready to play and took it to us in the first half.
"We weren't ready. I thought we would be, but we clearly weren't ready. They got an early goal, and we kind of fell apart."
📺 https://t.co/SGf1rMAsiBpic.twitter.com/aFNcfLZfBI
— BYU Women's Soccer (@byusoccer_w) October 24, 2025
Moments after the Cougars celebrated their lone senior Mackenzee Vance in the final home match of the regular season, Kansas was celebrating in front of goal after Saige Wimes put Livvy Moore's pass into the back of the net in the eighth minute.
Jillian Gregorski doubled the advantage five minutes later, pinging a right-footed rip from Kate Langfelder that put the Jayhawks in front 2-0. Lexi Watts made it 3-0 in the 24th minute as Kansas out-shot the Cougars 9-3 en route to the first-half shutout.
BYU pulled one back in the 55th minute. Afton Perry pulled a 50-50 ball off a pair of Kansas defenders, the found Walbruch on a run inside the box to finish for her team-high 11th goal of the season.
"We were able to take a break at halftime, and say, that's not acceptable," Rockwood said. "We came out and battled hard; I thought we played pretty well in the season half. We had lots of good chances, and had enough to tie the game at least.
"We've got to find people who want to score, who score score," she added. "Ellie's scoring a lot of goals for us, and right now we don't have anybody else who I think has the confidence and consistency to score. That's what happens with a young team, and we're just young right now. These are growing pains, and hopefully it pays off somewhere down the road."
BYU travels across the country over the weekend before kicking off Monday at UCF (11 a.m. MDT, ESPN+). The Cougars then close the regular season next Thursday, Oct. 30 at Utah (7 p.m. MDT, ESPN+).
