Men’s Soccer: Hoos defeat Mountaineers in NCAA second round, 2-1

By Colin Moore
JerryRatcliffe.com correspondent

No. 11 Virginia got a huge NCAA second-round victory against West Virginia at Klöckner stadium Sunday night, prevailing by a 2-1 score. The Cavaliers began the match slow and on the back foot, as they needed time to find their footing, but were able to advance to the next round.

“That is a great playoff win against a very good West Virginia team,” said UVA head coach George Gelnovatch. “When the final RPI came out, they were 16th, so I think we just played one of the top, better teams in the tournament in our first game and did a great job of handling it.”

UVA (11-6-3) went down early within the first three minutes, as the Mountaineers (13-2-7) created two corner kicks and managed to capitalize on the second. Both times, they played an inswinging ball towards the near post into a bunch of traffic and hoped for something good to happen. They managed just that when Marcus Caldeira cleaned up the bouncing ball in the box for the opening goal of the match.

“They scored and there isn’t anything you can do about it afterwards, so it was just getting back to our plan — the plan the whole week — and go from there. Don’t adjust because they scored,” said UVA’s Albin Gashi. “We have been working on set pieces. I kind of lost my guy and they took advantage of it.” 

The Hoos responded minutes later with a goal from Gashi. This occurred on a quick transition opportunity for the Hoos when Nick Dang launched a long ball towards AJ Smith. Smith perfectly redirected the ball with his header into the path of Gashi.

Gashi may have been fortunate to get this goal, as his build-up touch was a tad too long, allowing WVU keeper Marc Bonnaire to come off his line. Bonnaire made the initial save, but the ball deflected back into Gashi’s path and he finished on the open goal to tie it at 1-1.

“I saw a long ball go to AJ, and he was bullying their defenders today, so I knew he was going to flick it on,” Gashi said of his goal. “I ran behind and had a poor touch, but played a 1-2 with the keeper and somehow I got the ball in. I was just happy to get the ball in, as it’s very important to get a goal after theirs.”

Both teams had numerous scoring opportunities throughout, but both defenses and goalies were playing well, keeping it knotted up. The Hoos broke the tie in the 33rd minute from a great piece of possession. They had spurts where they really took care of the ball and possessed, which allowed them to generate some chances.

The second goal was initiated from a great switch off field from Paul Wiese. Wiese played a diagonal ball in the air to Daniel Mangorov, who took down the ball beautifully and before it touched the ground, he flicked it over his head to a sprinting Branden Lambe.

Lambe collected the ball and made a hard run towards the endline before cutting it back perfectly to Smith, who was sitting on the back post for an easy tap-in.

“Getting AJ going has been huge,” said Gelnovatch. “The guy is 6-5 and the most athletic, fastest guy on the team. I mean, I don’t think we have seen half of what he is capable of when he’s fully fit, but yeah, we can send him on the run and allow him to hold the ball up.”

The second half was nothing short of exciting, but neither team was able to score again. West Virginia actually generated more shots and shots on target in this match, but the Hoos’ resilience was the difference that allowed them to come out on top.

Joey Batrouni made numerous bigtime saves in the second half, keeping the Hoos in the lead. He made 3 saves from headers from the Mountaineers that could have completely changed the outcome of this match.

“Joey was nice and steady in there, calmed us down and was a good presence,” Gelnovatch said. 

The entire back line and midfield fought for the entire 90 minutes against a great West Virginia team and had spurts where they were defending for long stretches in this match.

Nick Dang was the catalyst and talked about it post-match, saying, “It’s hard, I mean they have a lot of threats up top, the balls they were serving in were very difficult to deal with, but it takes a toll on you. But at some point, you kind of get used to it, and those you just have to grind it out.” 

Dang also spoke on his team’s upcoming home matchup against Massachusetts, saying, “They are pretty happy being able to be here at home, a little warmer than Pennsylvania and we don’t have to travel, which is nice. Get to stay home for Thanksgiving.”

GOALS
WVU: 3’ – Marcus Calderia
UVA: 6’ – Albin Gashi (AJ Smith and Nick Dang)
UVA: 33’ – AJ Smith (Brenden Lambe and Daniel Mangorov)

ADDITIONAL NOTES

Courtesy UVA Media Relations

• AJ Smith scored his second career goal and first career game-winner
• Smith recorded a career-high, three points on the night
• Smith’s assist was the first of his Cavalier career
• Albin Gashi recorded his first goal since scoring in a 2-1 win over Virginia Tech (10/4)
• West Virginia’s goal in the third minute was the quickest of any Virginia opponent this season
• A total of 10 different Cavaliers have recorded game-winning goals in 2024

WITH THE WIN…

• Virginia advances to the third round of the NCAA Men’s Soccer Championship for the second consecutive season
• UVA records its first come-from-behind victory in the NCAA Men’s Soccer Championship since a 2-1 overtime win over Vermont (11/20/2016)
• The Cavaliers record their third comeback victory of the season and their second in the postseason
• The Cavaliers improve to 6-3 all-time against West Virginia

UP NEXT

The Cavaliers advance to the NCAA Round of 16 and will host UMass on Saturday at 5 p.m. at Klöckner Stadium (ESPN+). The unseeded Minutemen upset No. 6 seed Penn in the second round, 1-0. See the full bracket here.

Moving on ➡️#GoHoos pic.twitter.com/c83vZZATCd

— Virginia Men’s Soccer (@UVAMenSoccer) November 25, 2024