Men's Soccer Falls to Division II Opponent in Exhibition Match

Senior midfielder Arman Mogharei (right) on the attack.

The University of Redlands men's soccer team was in action at home against the University of California San Diego, a Division II opponent, for the second exhibition match of the preseason. Despite a valiant effort, the Bulldogs fell, 0-2, to the Tritons.

Throughout much of the first half, both teams displayed impressive defense with minimal shot attempts for either squad. At the 20:07 mark in the first half, the Tritons took advantage of a strong opportunity as sophomore forward Brett Jones (Mission Viejo, CA) entered the ball from the right wing and onto the foot of classmate forward Jonathan Sabouri (Carlsbad, CA). Sabouri did his job to seal off the defender and slip it past sophomore goalkeeper Matteo Defina (Livermore, CA) for the first score of the game.

After neither teams scored for the rest of the half, UCSD was back on the attack in the second frame. Just under 10 minutes after the break, Jones corralled a rebound off of a penalty kick and tapped it into the bottom left corner of the net to give the Tritons a 2-0 advantage. The Bulldogs best chance to score came at the 12:30 mark when junior midfielder Matias Lazo-Fanning (Seattle, WA) launched a ball from deep center field. To the surprise of the defense, the ball sailed over their heads and nearly dropped in time to make it into the goal. Unfortunately, the ball had just a little too much heat and missed the top post by a few inches. UCSD managed the final minutes of the match to preserve the exhibition victory.

The Bulldogs are back at home on Tuesday against Carthage College for the final exhibition game, before the regular-season opener on Friday.