NJAC Standings
NEWARK, N.J. (October 15, 2016) – The Rutgers University-Newark men's soccer team took over first place in the New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) standings with an emphatic 3-1 victory over third-ranked and previously undefeated Rowan University Saturday night in front of a capacity crowd at Alumni Field.
The win is the ninth in a row for Rutgers-Newark who improves to 15-2-0 overall and 6-1-0 in the conference. Rowan falls to 12-1-1 overall, 5-1-1 in the league and suffers its first regular-season loss since October 14, 2015.
Rutgers-Newark wasted no time in showing the Profs the 2016 meeting between the two schools would be different than 2015 as the Scarlet Raiders took a 1-0 lead just 2:38 into the match. On the play, sophomore
Breno Lustosa stole the ball just inside of midfield, made several touches before before delivering a precision pass into left side of the box to freshman
Fabio De Sousa who touched twice and calmly hammered a perfect shot across the mouth of the goal into the lower-right corner. The tally was his 11th of the year and the assist was the second for Lustosa.
Just 40 seconds into the match, Rutgers-Newark looked like it had a 1-0 lead but Rowan goalkeeper Kyle Dennis made a beautiful diving save to his left, keeping the ball outside the goal while his body went sliding into it.
The Scarlet Raiders created several other excellent early chances and both Lustosa and De Sousa had quality looks stopped by way of a dive from Dennis.
With 18 minutes left in the first, De Sousa took a gorgeous touch pass from junior
Alex Torres, but again it was Dennis keeping his team in the game with a great save.
Scarlet Raider goalkeeper
Andres Medina made several early saves on Rowan set pieces and helped the hosts take a 1-0 lead into halftime. Rutgers-Newark ended the opening period with a 12-5 margin in shots and a 2-1 edge in corners.
The Scarlet Raiders all but locked up the win with De Sousa's second goal of the contest and 12th of the season, but the play was made possible on the other end of the field by senior
Dylan Elias and Lustosa. About 10 yards outside the Scarlet Raider box, Elias stole a pass and sprung Lustosa on a sprint up the far sideline before Lustosa hit De Sousa with a picture-perfect lead pass. De Sousa chased it down, headed it to himself and did the rest, one-timing a chip shot before Dennis could break up the play. Lustosa registered his second assist of the game on what was a spectacular marker with 14:40 remaining.
The lead moved to three goals when
Alex Torres pocketed his fifth of the year, making a play on the end line and taking a shot that deflected in at 75:20. After the Torres goal, the Scarlet Raider crowd sensed victory was imminent and began chanting throughout the final horn. Torres started the sequence by throwing in to sophomore
Timothy Farias, who then gave it back to Torres with a pretty touch pass for the score.
Rowan ended a marvelous scoreless streak the Rutgers-Newark defense had put together, scoring a fluke goal on a scrum in front. The ball was served into the middle of the box from midfield, and after bouncing around for four-to-five seconds a shot caromed in off the foot of sophomore Burak Ozdemir. The goal was Ozdemir's second of the year and ended the scoreless streak at 684 minutes.
"I think we played well but not our best," said Head Coach
Kevin East after the win. "Our second half could have been better, and when Rowan had to push for goals, we were constantly sending balls in the air which made it hard to get the game settled down. When we got the ball on the floor, we created good chances, and ultimately we are pleased with the result against a tough team."
Each team ended with 15 total shots in the match, with the Scarlet Raiders holding an 11-9 margin in shots on goal. The two sides each took three corners.
Medina made eight saves to earn the win for the Scarlet Raiders, while Dennis made eight stops in the loss.
Rutgers-Newark will head to Hoboken and take on non-conference rival Stevens Institute of Technology Tuesday night at 7 p.m.
