The men’s soccer team continued their hot scoring this weekend after beating Concordia University 3-0 on Sept. 7 and adding a 3-1 win Sept. 9 against the Academy of Arts Urban Knights.
Sunday’s beautiful weather had the fans out to cheer on the pumped and motivated Jacks after coming away with a big win on Friday.
Jacks defender Gus Baxter got the team going with an unassisted goal at the 17:52 minute. Three minutes later, off of a set piece from seniormidfielder Max Steinmetz, Baxter assisted Jacks sophomore forward Alejandro Cortes Garcia to take an 2-0 lead against the Urban Knights.
“The ball and I had a great day today,” Baxter said. “My teammates were working hard and you could see that from the first 20 minutes of the game.”
The Jacks took care of business the first half. They were communicating with every pass made and a sense of control was present whenever they held possession.
The Jacks had seven shots, one corner kick, and only committed six fouls. The Urban Knights responded with four shots and zero corner kicks, followed by six fouls.
With the start of the second half, the Jacks were not as crisp with their passes as they were in the first half. At the 60:26 minute, the Urban Knights took advantage and freshman midfielder, Edvard Edvarsson, nailed the top left corner off a set piece to give the Urban Knights their first goal.
The Jacks took the jab thrown by the Urban Knights leaving the score at 2-1, and started to slow the game down and play to their tempo. The back line fixed their mistakes and held the Urban Knights to only three shots the entire second half, leaving Jacks senior goalkeeper, Bryan Hernandez, to save one other shot.
“We came out knowing we were in control,” Hernandez said. “What was hurting us were the little passes that where coming up short to get an attack going.”
Toward the end of the game the Jacks held their composure and continued to seek out another goal. At the 84:00 minute they were rewarded with an own goal by the Urban Knights sealing the deal with a 3-1 victory.
Steinmetz helped create the tone in the first half and commented on how his team performed.
“We came out aggressive and capitalized on set pieces,” Steinmetz said. “We as a team say, ‘come out with the beast’, and that beast was heard today with this win.”
The Jacks are set to play their first away game this season against rival Sonoma State on Sept. 12 at 4 p.m.
