The Hofstra men’s soccer team was not able to pull away with a win on Wednesday, March 3, as they lost 2-0 to the University of Massachusetts Minutemen at Garber Field in Amherst, MA. With this loss, the Pride is now at 1-2, while UMass is at 2-0. 

Hofstra was unable to score, shooting 22 times, seven of those on goal. There were three very good chances for the Pride to score that they couldn’t capitalize on.

UMass got on the right foot by scoring in the first 85 seconds of the game, when Minutemen defender Graham Brenner deflected the ball past Hofstra freshman goalkeeper Wessel Spiel and into the back of the net to put the Minutemen up 1-0. This would be the only goal of the game until the 83rd minute, when UMass took advantage of Hofstra midfielder Luca Tausch slipping, leading to a turnover.

Before UMass’ second goal, defender Angel Chinchilla made a sliding save to prevent a goal being scored. While Speel saved the initial shot by UMass midfielder Yosuke Hanya, the rebound was picked up and scored by James McPherson.  

Minutemen goalkeeper Marvyn Dorchin led UMass to victory, saving six of the seven Hofstra shots on goal, while the other one hit the bar.

Hofstra had three big chances to score. The first happened in the sixth minute, when Logan Brown stopped a Matthew Vowinkel shot on the line that was almost assured to go in, as Dorchin was off the goal line. Another opportunity came off one of Hofstra’s 10 corner kicks, when a header by freshman Ryan Carmichael was saved by Dorchin. In the 87th minute, Dorchin also saved a penalty kick by Vowinkel, which sealed the night for the Minutemen.

Tausch, Hendrik Hebbeker and Carmichael led the Pride in shots taken, each with four. Vowinkel had three shots, all of which were on goal, but none hit the back of the net.

Stefan Mason was shown a yellow card, the only card of the match for Hofstra. UMass, who were given three cards their previous game, were only shown one as well.

In three games against UMass, Hofstra is 0-2-1 all-time against the Minutemen.

The next game for the Pride will be their home opener on Saturday, March 13. Hofstra will host the Drexel University Dragons at the Hofstra Soccer Stadium at 2 p.m.

Photo Courtesy of Hofstra Athletics