By Zack Downing, Staff Writer
Both the UMass Dartmouth and Rhode Island College men’s soccer teams came into Saturday’s matchup hoping to get back on track to victory.
It was the RIC Anchormen that held home field advantage and planned on pumping up their crowd with a volley of scores. However, this game didn’t turn out to be an offensive battle.
No one attempted a shot for the first eight minutes of the game, when Rhode Island College’s Kossivi Dogbey took a shot on goal that was impressively blocked by Corsair Mike Tranghese.
A few Corsair corner kicks and a few Anchormen headers later, the score still remained 0-0, despite the intense action around the net.
It was the 28th minute when the scoreboard finally changed. A Rhode Island College free kick from Dennis Vasquez led straight to Komla Dogbey, brother of Kossivi Dogbey, who landed a header into the back of the net. The goal was Komla’s first of the season.
The Corsairs kept the shooting coming strong, but couldn’t connect with the goal to tie the score up.
Along with their many shots came many fouls, a total of 14 on the game, which certainly hampered their ability to come back and shift the momentum.
The final score was 1-0, Rhode Island College.
Meanwhile, at Cressy Field, the Corsair’s women’s soccer team was also facing off against Rhode Island College on that Saturday.
This game proved to be a much more blood-pumping match, mostly coming from an aggressive UMass Dartmouth offense.
The first goal came in the 9th minute with Corsairs senior Abby Silva scoring off an assist from true freshman Alexis Cote.
After that first point, the floodgates opened. The Corsairs took shot after shot at RIC’s goalkeeper Erica Edwards, with her standing her ground strong.
She had 8 saves on the game, but that ended up only being a fraction of the Corsairs’ shot total.
UMass Dartmouth attempted a total of 17 shots in the first half, which is more than the men’s team had in their whole game. However, the score still remained 1-0.
Something else this game featured a lot of was substitutions, giving many more players than usual a chance to put points on the scoreboard.
The Corsairs kept swinging and taking shots into the second half, forcing the Anchormen defense to keep pumping. RIC took several shots of their own, but Corsair goalkeeper Jaimee O’Brien kept them out of the net.
After a few UMass D corner kicks, (the Corsairs tried 7 in the game to RIC’s 1) another score finally came in the 81st minute when freshman Alexis Pacheco knocked it in the top left corner to bring it to 2-0.
The Anchormen got a little steam going when they scored 5 minutes later, but the game wrapped up without a fourth goal. The final score was 2-1, Corsairs.
The women’s next game at Cressy Field will be Wednesday the 18th facing Simmons College, and the men will be at home to host UMass Boston on Saturday, October 14.
Come to one or both of these games and root for the home team!