Boys soccer: Packers blanked by Spartans
Published 9:20 pm Tuesday, September 24, 2013
The Packer boys soccer team continues to show signs of improvement, but it was on the wrong side of a tough break in a 1-0 loss to Rochester Mayo (7-3-2, 5-0-1 Big Nine) at Art Hass Stadium Tuesday.
“I’m not happy about losing and the guys aren’t happy about losing, but we realize we play the whole season for a reason,” Austin head coach Jens Levisen said. “If we would’ve played these guys in the first week of the season, there’s no way it would’ve been one to zero. We’re moving in the right direction.”
Austin keeper Abraham Manzano made two outstanding saves in the first half. He stopped a line drive by diving out and stopping the ball with one hand with 5:11 left in the first and he made a diving save with 1:31 left in the first half.
Unfortunately for Austin (4-5-2 overall, 2-2-1 Big Nine), the ball deflected off of Manzano’s second diving stop straight to Mayo’s Ian Wright, who knocked it in for the only goal of the night.
Austin struggled with its offense as it had just one shot on goal in the loss. The Packers had a chance to tie the game when Roel Torres fired a 20-yard shot that went about two feet over the goal with 4:26 left in the game.
It was one of the rare chances Torres had to score on the night.
“It’s a credit to them. They played well and they were out to shut us down,” Levisen said. “I’m assuming they remembered that Roel was the guy that had two goals against them last year because they had two guys on him when he had the ball.”