The Valparaiso University men’s soccer team fell 2-1 on Saturday night on the road against Bowling Green. The Falcons scored twice in the first 20 minutes before senior Lucca Lacerda (Passos, Brazil / Mercy College) provided the Valpo goal in the 36^th minute.

How It Happened

• Tate Robertson got Bowling Green on the board in the 10^th minute, using a far-post blast after a right-side cross to make it 1-0 in favor of the Falcons. Robertson received assists from Vinny Worner and Chris Brennan.
• The lead doubled in the 18^th minute when Robertson nailed down a brace courtesy of a hard strike from the top of the box. Chris Sullivan registered the assist on the goal that made it 2-0 Bowling Green.
• Lacerda, who joined the team this season as a transfer, scored the first goal of his Valpo career in the 36^th minute. It came on a free kick from just outside the box to slice the deficit in half.
• Valpo goalkeeper Nacho Miras (Ubeda, Spain / Nuetra Semora del Pilar) recorded six saves, while Bowling Green’s Anthony Mwembia accumulated five.
• Bowling Green (2-5-2) owned a narrow 8-6 edge in shots on goal, while the two teams were dead even in total shots with 12 apiece. Lacerda led his team with five shots, placing four on goal.

Thoughts from Head Coach Mike Avery

“It was an interesting, tense and very even battle tonight between two teams that are really having mirror seasons. BGSU is a good team. They’ve played well throughout the season, have outshot their opponents in almost every game, yet - up until tonight - they’ve not been able to get the results they probably have deserved based on their performances. That’s a familiar story for us.”

“The game tonight was going to be decided by something small since the teams are pretty evenly matched. Maybe it was the travel since we made the trip up this morning, maybe the game Tuesday night played a factor since it went late because of the lightning delay, but for whatever reason we started slowly and the home team took advantage. After the first 15 minutes we played pretty well and pushed the issue, but in games this tight you can’t gift a team anything.”

“We got some great performances individually out of some players that hadn’t featured much yet this season. Junta Callahan, Jordan Davis, Tyler Curylo, Jordan James, for example, gave us a lift when we needed it. It’s great to know we can count on the whole squad. We have a very quick turnaround to the next game and we will need to keep rotating players so that we can fully focus on the remaining conference games.”

Up Next

Valpo (2-6-1) will be back home on Monday night to welcome Oral Roberts at 6 p.m. in a match that will be broadcast on ESPN+. Links to live video and stats are available on ValpoAthletics.com.