Men's Soccer fell to conference foe Vaughn College last night by a score of 2-1. The Panthers are now 2-5 overall and 1-3 in the HVIAC, while the VC Warriors are 2-0 and 1-0 in the league.
ACPHS weathered a bit of a storm in the opening ten minutes, as the Warriors forced Panther goalie
Ryan Hobson to make his first save just two minutes into the contest. Albany controlled the game from there on, opening the scoring in the 11
th minute through sophomore
Chuck Middleton. Freshman
Gavin Carvey picked up the ball and back-heeled a pass that released Middleton behind the VC defense. The Cicero native drove in on Vaughn goalie Christopher Weiss and finished far post for his first goal of the season. The assist was Carvey's team-leading third of the year.
The Panther lead didn't last long, as Vaughn struck back just over a minute later. Forward Azzeddine Sekkat received the ball from Djusalem Merise and unleashed a rocket that flew in off the post past Hobson to tie the score at one.
Albany fashioned the better of the chances to close out the half, as senior
Noah Keith constantly put dangerous balls into the box that seemed to barely miss a teammate every time. The best example of this came in the 22
nd minute, when Keith found the head of Carvey following a corner kick. The freshman rose above everyone to win the ball, but his shot went straight at the Vaughn keeper, leaving the score at 1-1 after the first 45 minutes.
The teams were evenly matched for most of the second half, but is was Vaughn who would eventually grab the winning goal. Both Middleton and Carvey had one-on-one opportunities with the Warrior goalie that they failed to convert before VC forward Kevin Moreira secured victory for his team in the 83
rd minute. The goal came from a counterattack after ACPHS had thrown men forward for a corner. Sekkat skipped past a few Panther defenders before finding Moreira who beat Hobson near post.
In the end it was another conference loss for the Albany, who will need to perform well in their last two conference games against King's and Culinary if they want to qualify for the HVIAC playoffs. Their next game will be a non-conference matchup with Bryant & Stratton (Albany) this Sunday, September 29
th, at 3:00 PM.