DENVER – It was a special moment.
 
Eight months after surgery, senior Elisa Dean scored her first goal of the season Sunday – the only goal in a 1-0 win over Bridgeport (Conn.) in women's soccer at the Assembly Athletic Complex.
 
"I still have chills," Dean said. "It feels really good. I'm really pleased, but there's still a lot of work to be done."
 
Dean scored in the 52^nd minute to cap a beautiful sequence of passes. Defender Elli Zimmer sent a long pass up the right touch line to Katy Coats, who then passed to Luna Garcia in the middle of the field. Garcia calmly passed to Dean above and left of the goal box, and Dean crunched her shot into the right corner.
 
It was Dean's sixth career goal.
 
"I was so proud of her," MSU Denver coach Kat Mertz said. "I'm proud of her hard work and resilience and perseverance. She's motivated and determined. She just didn't give up. She's still recovering and we're working to get her back to full strength for the RMAC season."
 
Spurred on by Dean's goal and four spectacular first-half saves by Kylie Bach, the Roadrunners improved to 2-1-1 during non-conference play with a victory over the program that won the 2018 NCAA Division II national championship.
 
"I've got to give UB a lot of credit," Mertz said. "They know how to win. The first half, they showed us who they were. We had to step it up and thankfully Kylie made some big-time saves for us."
 
Bridgeport had possession in dangerous areas in front of the Roadrunners goal for most of the first half of the first half. But Bach made spectacular saves at 6:39, 11:12, 22:00 and 22:45 to keep the game scoreless.
 
"There was definitely a lot of adrenaline kicking in," Bach said. "There was a bit more pressure at first because they were coming at us. But towards halftime we had changed it up and attacked them first."
 
Said Dean: "Kylie absolutely crushed it. She was amazing. We couldn't have asked more from her – everything from distribution to those epic saves."
 
Bach has split the first four starts of the season with returning All-RMAC second team goalkeeper Kayla Caballero, and is unscored upon in 452 career minutes in goal, including 180 in two shutout wins this season.
 
"We've been open and honest with Kayla and Kylie," Mertz said. "They're both excellent. They both have some really great qualities. They have some different strengths. Kayla has done some great things and we've talked to Kylie about being ready for those moments, and she was ready.
 
"Her saves woke us up. We had to mark better in the box. We made an adjustment to our shape and that settled us a bit."
 
As the game wore on during a steaming-hot day, MSU Denver's depth appeared to take a toll on Bridgeport, which also lost 2-1 Friday at CSU-Pueblo and is now 1-3.
 
"They're a team that lost on Friday night and they came out on fire," Mertz said. "No one wants to go on a road trip and go 0-2. They had some some really good players. We need to be quicker recognizing what they were doing. And I thought we were too nice with our pressure. Finally we got a little more physical."