What you need to know:
* Georgia State earned a 2-1 victory over Texas State to close the opening day the Sun Belt Tournament at Lakepoint Sporting Community in Emerson, Ga.
* The Panthers' two goals came in the first half by Suzanne Arafa and Ashley Nagy.
* Georgia State will play Troy Friday at 7 p.m. in the Sun Belt Conference Tournament semifinals.
EMERSON, Ga.—With a pair of early first-half goals, No. 6-seed Georgia State upset No. 3-seed Texas State 2-1 in the final quarterfinal match of the day at the Sun Belt Women's Soccer Championship at the LakePoint Sport Community, north of Atlanta on Wednesday.
Georgia State will advance to the semifinals on Friday to face No. 2-seed Troy at 7 p.m. In the first semifinal at 4 p.m., No. 1 South Alabama will face No. 4 Appalachian State. The winners will meet in the championship game, with an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament on the line, on Sunday at 1 p.m.
Georgia State improved to 11-5-3 on the season and earned its first Sun Belt tournament victory since joining the league two years ago. Texas State, which defeated the Panthers earlier this year and knocked Georgia State out of the conference tournament last year, finished 12-6-0.
Georgia State got on the board first as Suzanne Arafa was fouled in the box and proceeded to put a penalty kick in the back of the net in the fifth minute, giving the Panthers an early 1-0 lead. Arafa, who earned All-Sun Belt First-Team honors on Tuesday night, scored her team-leading eighth goal of the season.
The Panthers scored again in the 27th minute as Ashley Nagy grabbed a pass from Arafa to take a 2-0 lead midway through the half. Nagy, who earned All-Sun Belt Second-Team honors just the night before, scored her seventh goal of the season. Nagy leads the team in game-winning goals with four.
Coming out of the half trailing 2-0, Texas State finally got on the board in the 65th minute with a goal by Lynsey Curry, assisted by Taylor Allen, to cut the lead in half. Curry, the Sun Belt Offensive Player of the Year, scored her 11th goal of the season.
In the evenly-contested match, Georgia State outshot the Bobcats 10-9, leading with six shots on goal to Texas State's four.
"We've been in the quarterfinals before and it was time to take it to a new level, so the team is very excited to get past this hurdle. Our goal was to win tonight and we did that so now our goal has changed, it's a matter of playing Troy in the semifinals. We got to see them play today and we played them earlier this year. We're looking forward to Friday's match at 7 p.m.," head coach Derek Leader said of the game.
The tournament, originally scheduled to be played on the grass field at the GSU Soccer Complex, had to be moved 30 miles north of Atlanta to a turf field following torrential rains last week that flooded the field.
