TAYLORSVILLE, Utah – The 18th-ranked Western Nebraska Community College men’s soccer team and the 9th-ranked Salt Lake Community College had a battle Thursday in both teams season-opener as the two teams had to settle for a 1-1 tie.
WNCC men’s head coach Eseah Ingram said after a slow start, the Cougars played much better in the second half.
“We played decent, took us a little longer than I wanted to get into the game,” Ingram said. “But, once we found our confidence, it got much better. We played a much better game in the second half.”
The first half saw neither team score as the two teams went into the locker room tied at 0-0.
The second half was a battle. Salt Lake scored first in the 55th minute when Abe Ashby scored to make it 1-0. WNCC kept playing well and in the 74th minute, Yediel Hernandez beat a Salt Lake player on the outside and fed the ball to Randall Jacquez in the middle. Jacquez then found Alvaro Abeal in the middle and Abeal made a move, beat his defender, and fired the ball into the back of the net to tie the game.
Ingram said that tying goal is exactly how they want to play.
“The tying goal was exactly how we play our futbol,” he said. Biggest criticism of our team today is we didn’t play our style. I’d say Salt Lake did a great job of making us play their way and we found out today that doesn’t work for us. But we were able to move the ball and connect at the right moment and our captain did what he does best and finished off a solid build up play.”
Neither team had a lot of shots today. WNCC managed four shots while Salt Lake had six. Owen Henderson managed four saves in net for the Cougars.
Ingram said the second half was much better played than the first.
“The difference between the two halves was desire and attitude,” he said. “We fought for 90 minutes, didn’t play our best game but we played well enough to keep it close and equalize after they went up by a goal on us in the second. The red cards messed with both teams, so it was sloppy at the end but it was a proper match.”
WNCC will have a day off to recover and then they will get back on the pitch for a game Saturday against No. 17 Snow College. Snow College opened the season Thursday with a 2-1 win over Northwest College.
“We must move on. Today was a solid result but we must push for more,” Ingram said. “A tie isn’t enough, we must grow and learn from our mistakes today and make sure we capitalize on Saturday. Snow is another ranked team and top opponent and we must be ready