Greyhounds complete season-sweep of ASC
Rodrigues tallies two for ENMU
ALAMOSA, Colo.— The Eastern New Mexico University Greyhounds completed a home-and-home sweep of the Adams State College Grizzly men’s soccer team with a 3-0 win, Saturday afternoon here at Murphy Field.
The Greyhounds, who had bested ASC by a 5-1 count on Sept. 27 in Portales, N.M., received a 38th minute goal from Kal Herbert and then two more from team-leading Emerson Rodrigues in the first 8:15 of the second half as they improved to 8-3-2 on the year.
The Grizzlies, playing for just the second time at home during this their inaugural season, fell to 0-8-3.
The Greyhounds controlled much of the possession in the first half but did not score until the 38:40 mark when Herbert received a pass from Diego Santos before chipping the ball over Grizzly net-minder Jarod Thomas’ (Arvada, Colo.) head and into the net to tally his third goal of the season.
The Grizzlies then went a man down less than two minutes later when Jordan Selland (Spokane, Wash.) was sent off for receiving his second caution in the foul-plagued game that saw the Grizzlies whistled for a school-record 27 fouls, eight more than they were called for in the last meeting between the teams.
Although the Grizzlies were out-shot 9-4 in the first half and 19-9 overall, they did have some solid chances, most notably in the 15th minute when Bryan Heath (Port Orchard, Wash.), who took three shots to lead the Grizzlies, sent a shot wide right after a nice cross.
The Grizzlies’ Jesse Dunbar (Spokane, Wash.), also had a nice chance from 25 yards out sail high in the 32nd minute before the Greyhounds scored with just 6:20 to go in the first half.
The Greyhounds, who were whistled for an incredible 10 offsides violations thanks in part to their long-ball tactic, then struck again just 2:16 into the second period when Edgar Bear brought the ball down the right side of the field on a counter-attack before feeding it over to Rodriguez, who put the ball into the right side of the goal from 15 yards out.
Then just 6:01 later, Rodriguez, who now has eight goals on the season, received a long pass from Bear, who had two assists in the game, cutting into the right side netting past Thomas who had come out to try to intercept the pass.
The Greyhounds, who had an 8-1 advantage in corner kicks throughout the afternoon, then took four of just in a series of two minutes as they continued the control possession. However, the Grizzlies were able to clear all of them and eventually got their offense going in the final 13 minute shots as Heath and Joseph Jallow (Oldjeshwang, Gambia) each headed balls in the box after a long pass.
Peter Freeman (Longmont, Colo.) and Heath also took shots on goal in the closing stages of the game but could not fool Greyhound goalkeeper Josh Bussen, who made a diving stop on Heath’s 20-yard shot from just to the right of center, which helped the junior earn his second shutout of the campaign.
Bussen, now 5-1 on the year, made all three necessary saves while lowering his goals against average to 0.94.
Thomas also made three saves for the Grizzlies before giving way to junior Lowell Rompf (Conifer, Colo.), who entered after the Greyhounds’ corner kick bonanza.
Rompf, playing for jut the second time, made two saves in the final 22:13.
Mychael Contrerras led the Greyhounds, who had 17 men play for more than a half-hour.
Dunbar and Rami Avalos (Alamosa, Colo.) had two shots each for ASC.
The Grizzlies next play Tuesday night at UC-Colorado Springs before returning home to close out their season with an Oct. 18 clash with Westminster (Utah) at noon. They have played both teams already this season falling to the UC-Colorado Springs Mountain Lions by a 3-0 count in their home-opener on Sept. 1 before falling 3-1 to Westminster on Sept. 11 in Salt Lake City.
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