The Emory men’s soccer team resumed UAA competition last week, traveling to Cleveland on Friday night to face off against the Case Western Reserve Spartans before heading to Pittsburgh on Sunday to take on the Carnegie Mellon Tartans.
The Eagles fell to the Spartans 2-0, their first loss in six games. Case Western took the lead in the 41st minute from a free kick. The goal was the first to bring Emory senior goalkeeper Abe Hannigan’s scoreless streak of 517:26 minutes to an end. Case Western added a second goal in the 83rd minute.
Emory Head Coach Sonny Travis was impressed by the opposition’s display, yet suggested that had the ball bounced differently on a few occasions, the result may have been different.
“I thought [Case Western] were excellent on the night,” Travis said. “They deserved to win and played very well, and they countered better than any team we saw all year. We had a number of chances to equalize at 1-0, and they cleared multiple balls off of the goal line.”
The Eagles then continued play against Carnegie Mellon. Emory took the lead early in the 17th minute thanks to senior defender Matt Sherr, who scored off a diving header from a corner kick by sophomore midfielder/forward Christian Meyer. The goal was his third of the season.
Carnegie was able to send the match into overtime after Tartans freshman forward Sean MacPherson steered a long ball from teammate and senior defender Greg Allen into the Emory net. In overtime, the Eagles were able to hold on for a draw and a point despite playing with a numerical disadvantage after junior midfielder/defender Scott Haley received a second yellow card and was sent off.
Travis saw both the positive and negative sides of the result.
“We played a man down for most of [the] two overtimes, and we battled to salvage the match,” he said.
Travis added that Hannigan had an excellent match against Carnegie, and that sophomore Jason McCartney was “one of the better midfielders on the field”.
Losing senior forward Sebastian Hardington to a concussion during the game was a big loss for the Eagles and Coach Travis explained that while his absence was felt by the team, they were able to recover.
Sherr said that although the team did not win either of its games this weekend, the players are still focused on accomplishing their goal, which is to win the UAA title.
“The mindset of the team remains strong,” Sherr said.We are currently sitting in third place in the UAA. We will need to win our next three conference games to put ourselves in a strong position to win the UAA.”
The Emory men’s soccer team resumes action at home on Wednesday, facing off against the Birmingham-Southern Panthers at 7 p.m.
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