Spencer Schomaker pumped his fist while his team celebrated euphorically. The senior had just scored the game-tying goal with 1:07 left in regulation of the Orange’s Big East contest against Rutgers Saturday night.

The crowd erupted and the players seemed rejuvenated. Despite not playing its best brand of soccer for most of the night, Syracuse had evened things up at two, in a game that forward Kyle Hall called a ‘must-win’ Friday. It seemed to have momentum on its side heading into overtime.

The same scene took place in overtime, in front of 811 at the SU Soccer Stadium with 1:09 left on the clock. Except SU was on the wrong end of this celebration. .

Rutgers midfielder Sam Archer’s goal in the top-right corner of the net in the first overtime (99th minute) handed Syracuse a crushing 3-2 defeat. Although Syracuse (5-4-3, 2-4-1) tied the game late, it did not play a cohesive game of soccer.

‘It’s a pretty hard loss, this was really a must-win,’ junior forward Kyle Hall said. ‘I felt like they didn’t out-play us. They played well, but we handed them more of the game than them out-playing us.’

For most of the night, Syracuse did not seem in-sync. The team gave up a season-high 20 shots and did not pressure Rutgers for most of the game, outside of the team’s first and last goals.

Between the goals, which spanned 83-plus minutes, Rutgers played a more balanced and poised game. The Scarlet Knights worked the ball into the Orange side of the field and fired 12 shots on goal. When Syracuse took the ball onto Rutgers’ half of the field, the possession often ended without a shot on goal or one without a clean look.

‘We were just flat and lethargic, and we didn’t have the spring in our step and the energy level you needed to be a good defending team,’ SU head coach Dean Foti said. ‘Before we got our first goal, I knew it was going to be a long night, because we weren’t doing what we needed to close people down and be a good defending team and it bared itself out over the course of the night.’

SU took an early lead in the game, when Pete Rowley scored his first goal of the season on an unassisted free kick in the sixth minute.

That’s when the problems started. Syracuse relaxed offensively. The team did not attack the goal with the same offensive fervor. This strategy worked into the second half, but when Rutgers’ Dilly Duka beat SU goalkeeper Rob Cavicchia from the left side of the box in the 59th minute, SU found itself in a tied game.

About eight minutes later, Duka added a second goal from close to the same location and Rutgers seemed to have a commanding 2-1 lead.

‘I think we didn’t step up enough after we got that goal,’ Hall said. ‘I think we got a lot more relaxed and that was a bad decision because they started taking to us the game.’

SU knotted things on Schomaker’s heroics with the clock getting closer and closer to zero. Hall crossed the ball into the box and Schomaker beat Rutgers’ goalie Amir Haghshenas in front of a swarm of players. Despite seeming destined for a regulation loss, SU had suddenly tied the game and gave itself a chance to win a game it probably should not have.

‘When you’re down one goal with 10 minutes left you pull a defender out and just start knocking balls in,’ Schomaker said.

‘Luckily, Kyle gave a great cross and I did anything I could to get anything on the ball. It was good to get it into overtime, but we would’ve liked to get a result after that.’

The result, though, came for Rutgers. Archer beat Cavicchia in the top-right corner on an assist from Duka to give the Scarlet Knights the road win and the crucial Big East points. Hall said the team did not track back well on the play and Archer was able to finish the play without anyone defending him.

The play, though, was not the only time the team did not defend well on the night. Outside of its late and early goals, Syracuse was dysfunctional and paid for it with its second straight loss and third in four games.

‘We didn’t put an entire game together,’ Foti said. ‘We weren’t sharp enough in overtime, which was kind of indicative of the entire game. We weren’t sharp the whole game.’

mrehalt@syr.edu

Published on October 12, 2008 at 12:00 pm