It was a weekend of disappointment and hope for the men’s
soccer team. On Friday, UCLA had a chance to finish second in the
Pac-10 by beating visiting No. 22 San Diego State, but instead the
Bruins played to a 1-1 tie, finishing the conference season in a
disappointing fourth place. Sunday, the Bruins (10-5-4, 4-3-3
Pac-10) dominated University of San Diego (10-8-1) 3-1, greatly
helping their chances to get a good draw in the NCAA Tournament and
the home-field advantage that comes with it. “Of course we
wanted to win (against USD),” coach Jorge Salcedo said.
“But you look at what happened (last weekend) against Cal and
Stanford … we obviously had a poor performance against Cal. I
thought we had a better performance against San Diego State and an
even better one today. So we have a little bit of momentum going
into the tournament.” Members of the men’s soccer team
will be crowded together this afternoon during NCAA Tournament
selection, waiting to see where and whom they will play first. The
team has mixed feelings about where it stands.
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“We got some momentum with a good strong win over a pretty
good opponent (in USD), but we wanted to have a better record and a
couple more wins going in,” sophomore Jason Leopoldo said.
Friday was an example of a win that got away from UCLA. After
missing wide in the 25th minute, Leopoldo came back in the 26th
minute with a shot that hit off the crossbar. Freshman David
Estrada was in the perfect place to take the rebound shot and put a
header in the back of the net, putting the Bruins up 1-0. The lead
was short-lived, however, with the Aztecs (9-5-4, 5-2-3) answering
in the 30th minute when freshman Nick Cardenas headed a corner kick
past goalkeeper Brian Perk to tie the game at one apiece. The two
teams would continue battling in a physical matchup, but neither
team could find the back of the net. Perk made a one-handed save to
preserve the game in overtime and finished with four saves, while
San Diego State’s Tally Hall had a strong performance as
well, finishing with five saves on the day. “(Friday) was
definitely very frustrating,” Leopoldo said.
“We’re a much better team than them. Nothing against
them, but we’re a better team and we weren’t up to par
on the day and didn’t come out to play.” Sunday was an
entirely different experience for the Bruins. UCLA began with a
pregame ceremony honoring the team’s two graduating seniors,
defender Kiel McClung and goalkeeper Eric Reed. “It was an
emotional roller coaster for me,” McClung said. “I felt
like I was gonna start crying right there during the opening
ceremony. It’s just such a great honor to be able to play
here for four years.” When the Bruins took the field, they
did some shifting in positions. Freshman midfielder Kyle Nakazawa
was moved up into the front line, and helped create opportunities
and goals for the Bruins. “(He) does really well to help us
on the attack and be goal-dangerous,” Salcedo said. “I
like the look of having Kyle up front and there’s a good
chance we may do that (in the tournament).” Nakazawa was
involved in the Bruins’ first goal of the game, when he and
Leopoldo had the ball around the box. After a first attempt on goal
bounced back out, Leopoldo got his own rebound and put it in the
back of the net in the 42nd minute to make it a 1-0 halftime score.
The Bruins came out firing in the second half, with Leopoldo
passing to Estrada running into the box, who responded with a
strong finish from the right side to make the score 2-0. Nakazawa
then struck with a goal of his own when Estrada made an aggressive
run into the box, juked the keeper, and passed to Nakazawa for the
finish. USD closed the gap to 3-1 when Chase Tangney hit a shot
from 25 yards out, and almost made it a one-goal game, but defender
Greg Folk threw himself into the goal to knock out a shot after
Reed had been drawn out. “That was a huge play just because
it was 3-1 at the time with over 15 minutes left in the
game,” McClung said. “If they get that goal, the whole
momentum changes. And Greg ““ the way he got back there and
got that ball was great.” The Bruins hope to take the
momentum from Sunday’s game and turn it into a tournament
run. “We’ve been a team of streaks,” McClung
said. “Hopefully we can put a streak together right now and
make it to the final four.”