Tritons Hands Mocs First Defeat in SSC Opener

LAKELAND â€" Eckerd took advantage of a ball bouncing around inside the box midway through the first, and did pretty much the same thing midway through the second. The ball didn’t bounce so kindly for Florida Southern. The Tritons used those plays to send the Moccasins to their first defeat of the season, leaving Barnett Field with a 2-1 victory in the Sunshine State Conference opener for both teams.

Each team had only one shot through the first 22 minutes before the game opened up a bit, with the Tritons (3-2, 1-0) scoring the first goal of the night at the 28:33 mark. Daniel Lopez served the ball into the box from the left sideline, and a mix-up on defense allowed it to drop in the middle of the field. With the ball loose inside the six-yard box, George Marchant got a foot on it for the Tritons before Matt Thompson finished the play for his second goal of the season.

Florida Southern (4-1-1, 0-1) answered emphatically in the 38th minute when Givi Kokaia received a pass from Zach Hofstetter and hit a laser from 25 yards that slammed into the net for his sixth goal of the season. The assist allowed Hofstetter to set a new school record with at least one point in seven straight games, a streak that began in the final game of 2009.

“We didn’t start with a great deal of confidence tonight, and I’m really not sure why,” said Moccasin coach Hugh Seyfarth. “We didn’t have much flow and the first 25 minutes were not good. After Eckerd scored, it seemed to wake us up, and we played very good soccer for the rest of the half.”

Eckerd had four shots early in the second half, but it was back-to-back shots in the 72nd minute that produced the night’s final tally. Given a free kick at the top of the box, Mark Lee hit it low and hard toward the near post where FSC goalkeeper Johan Jonsson got a hand on it. The ball bounces away, however, and Jimmy Lawler connected on a follow-up attempt to give the Tritons a 2-1 lead.

Eckerd did not have another shot the rest of the night, while Florida Southern, which had not had one in the second half up to that point, had six. Hofstetter had the first of those when he ripped a shot from the far right wing that was saved by Toni Virtanen. Kokaia then got a header at close range after a long serve from J.D. Ruiz in the back, but Virtanen stopped that as well.

The Mocs eventually sent center back Ashley Holmes forward, and the move helped them get four shots in the final seven minutes. With the aid of Hofstetter and Ryan Arndt, Holmes threatened the goal with two headers, one of them a diving effort in the 87th minute that stayed too far to the right. The Mocs had another near miss during that stretch when the passing of Ruiz and Kokaia set up Jovaughn Howard for a run down the middle, but the sophomore forward was also denied by the Eckerd goalkeeper.

The final shot came from Brad Hunt with less than 10 seconds to play after a run into the right side of the box, but Virtanen had taken away the angle and stopped it in front of the near post. It was his fourth save of the night, with all of them coming in the final 20 minutes. His two biggest plays in the first half came in the 31st minute when he deflected a dangerous cross by Hunt, and in the 45th when he punched out a free kick by Hofstetter.

Jonsson also made four saves for Florida Southern, as each team finished 11 shots.

“You can’t come out and play the way we did for most of tonight and expect to win games in the Sunshine State Conference,” said Seyfarth. “We didn’t play the same caliber of soccer we played on the last trip against Thomas and West Florida. The guys have responded to every challenge so far though, so the question now is, how will we respond to this going to Rollins next week. We’re still a very good team, but so are Eckerd and Rollins. Every game in the SSC is tooth and nail, so you have to play at a high level every time out.”

Florida Southern and Rollins square off on Saturday night at 7:00 in Winter Park.