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Bucknell Men's Soccer Edges Holy Cross 1-0 in 1,000th Game in Program History
Oct. 10, 2009 LEWISBURG, Pa. - Freshman CK Kumah (Accra, Ghana/The Hotchkiss School) scored in the first half and the Bucknell defense made sure it held up in a 1-0 Patriot League win over Holy Cross on Saturday at Emmitt Field at Holmes Stadium. The Bison were victorious in the 1,000th game in program history and have now won four in a row to improve to 9-3 overall and 2-1 in the Patriot League. Bucknell managed only two shots in a mostly uneventful first half, but it capitalized on one of them. Luke Joyner (Dallas, Texas/J.J. Pearce) settled a long ball at the top of the box and touched it back to Kumah, whose hard, low shot glanced off the left post and into the net. Protecting a 1-0 lead, the Bison kept the ball out of harm's way for most of the second half. In fact, they amped up the offensive pressure, launching 16 second-half shots. After not garnering a corner kick in the opening 45 minutes, they had eight in the second half. Thomas Booth made point-blank saves on Tommy McCabe (Sarasota, Fla./Cardinal Mooney) and Josh Plump (Millburn, N.J./Millburn) to keep it a 1-0 game as Bucknell peppered the net throughout the second half. Holy Cross (3-8-0, 1-2-0) had few dangerous chances in the late stages. Tommy Caso (Phoenix, Md./McDonogh), who made five saves in the game, came off his line to deflect a tough-angle shot by Shane Regan inside four minutes to play. The Crusaders earned their lone corner kick of the day just before that, but Matt Beckley's header went well wide. For Caso, the clean sheet was his fifth of the season and eighth of his career.
Ross Liberati (Warwick, Md./Tower Hill) moved from midfield to the back line in the second half, and he and Patrick Selwood (Darnestown, Md./The Heights School) were rock solid all day in the center of the defense, not allowing Patriot League Preseason Offensive Player of the Year Kyle Miller any room to operate. Andrew Powell (Charlton, Mass./St. John's) and Travis Rand (Westbrook, Maine/Westbrook) were also strong on the edges, as most of Holy Cross' shots came from outside the box. The Bison finished with an 18-13 shot advantage, including 16-7 margin in the second half. The defense earned its sixth shutout of the year, all of them coming by 1-0 scores. Patriot League scoring leader Conor O'Brien (Mt. Sinai, N.Y./St. Anthony's) was kept off the score sheet for only the second time this season, but the senior captain was terrific all day in the middle of the field. He attempted four shots and set up a number of good scoring chances. He played a terrific through ball on the play where Plump was robbed by Booth, and earlier in the second half he made a brilliant back-heel pass to Ryan Sappington (Barboursville, Va./Shattuck-St. Mary's), whose hard strike was barely deflected wide off the foot of a defender. At 9-3 on the season, the Bison have their best record after 12 games since 2002, when they started 9-2-1. Next up for Bucknell is a trip to Marquette on Tuesday at 3 p.m. (Eastern). |
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