Mens soccer goes 0-2 vs Middlebury and Vassar

Garrett Collins

Men’s soccer looked to rebound after a 5-1 loss vs RPI Sept. 11 in Troy, NY, taking a road trip to Middlebury Vermont to take on the Panthers last tuesday.  Middlebury was posting a 2-0 record going into the game, winning their first two games pretty handley winning 6-0 and 3-1.  Plattsburgh seemed to be one of the first teams that was able to slow down the offence of Middlebury holding them only to one goal for the entire 90 minute match and holding them to only two shots on goal.

The game started a bit slow for the Cardinals offense, only having one shot in the entire first half compared to the Panthers’ six shots in the first half.  The defense of the Cardinals was a factor in the first half not allowing a single goal in the first half despite the shots flying from Middlebury.  

The second half of the game would prove to be a different story as the Cardinals clocked six shots in the second half only being outshot by the Panther’s by two.  As the waning minutes of the game checked down on the scoreboard the Cardinals were still locked in with their opponent tied at 0-0, until the 85th minute when Middlebury’s Micheal McFarline kicked a free kick from the left side of the field and the ball found its way into the 18 yard box where Ethan Coomber landed the header allowing the Panther’s to squeeze past Plattsburgh 1-0.  

Later that week the Cardinals welcomed the Vassar College Brewers.  Plattsburgh would come out stronger in the first half then they did earlier in the week putting up 3 shots compared to Vassar’s 5. The first half was close, tied 0-0 until ten seconds left in the half where once again a late goal would break a scoreless tie. A corner kick from the left side from Austin Lukasik was headed at the box by Ethan Snyder which was passed over to Naten Logan who scored the first goal of the game at 44:49. 

Plattsburgh pushed the pedal to the metal in the second half where they clocked 8 goals in the second half. Unfortunately, Vassar still scored more than Plattsburgh 9-8.  The game continued to run on with Vassar still holding the upperhand 1-0. Late in the second half in minute 76 scored off a pass from Ryan Lane.  Putting the Brewers up 2-0 and winning the game.

The Cardinals now fall to 2-3 and are looking forward to the slate of games next week versus Russell Sage and Oswgo, where they hope to get a win and move to .500 on the season, after learning from these games against tough opponents and using that momentum to get back to winning.