By By Dave Diamond
FRANTIC FINISH
The 2-2 tie against St. Francis College (N.Y.) last Wednesday featured three goals in the final 4:30 of regulation. After Michael Todd scored within the first ten minutes of the game, no scoring came until St. Francis’ Peter Ramirez scored on his own rebound in the 85th minute. Pride captain Matthew Telling answered right back on a direct kick with 2:29 left to regain the lead. However, the Terriers would score on a corner kick only 1:13 later to force overtime. Coach Nuttall said it was a lack of focus that cost the team a win.
“It’s what we thought all along: we have a talented team,” he said. “One of our problems is concentration. We lost concentration, scored, and lost concentration again. Hopefully, we can refer back to that game so it doesn’t happen again in the future.”
Ironically, a similar situation occured during last years Colonial Athletic Association title run. After blowing a late lead in conference play, the team carried that extra focus into its string of six consecutive victories before losing to the University of Maryland in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.
HIGH ANXIETY
The 3-1 victory over Loyola ended an impressive streak for the Pride, dating back to last year’s regular season. Going back to last year, 13 of the Pride’s 14 regular season games (including the first seven this season) have been decided by one goal or less. The only exception, a 2-0 win over Drexel in last year’s regular season finale, comes with somewhat of an asterisk. The Pride scored its second goal of that game with only 30 seconds remaining.
TODD TEARING IT UP
Senior forward Michael Todd has an excellent chance of becoming the Pride’s first 10 goal scorer since Aboubacar Camara had ten goals in 2000. With six already this season, he is on pace to score 14, which would put him four short of the Pride single-season record of 18 by Ed Gaffney in 1968.
He became just the fourth player in coach Nuttall’s 16 seasons to reach the 20-goal mark. Stuart Duffin (1996-99) holds the school record with 50-career goals.