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After a long pass from his teammate down the field, Virginia’s Leo Afonso used his chest to gain possession and then used his foot to move the ball forward into Syracuse territory. Once Afonso reached the box with five minutes left in the game, he immediately faced three Orange defenders — Olu Oyegunle, Buster Sjoberg and Christian Curti.

Despite this pressure, Afonso found enough space to take a shot with his left foot that sailed into the top right corner of the net, giving the Cavaliers the only goal of the game.

Afonso’s last-second goal shattered No. 3 Syracuse’s (7-1-1, 2-1 Atlantic Coast) unbeaten record. Following SU midfielder Jeorgio Kocevski’s second yellow card of the match, Virginia (6-3, 2-1 ACC) played with a man-up for the final 69 minutes of the match. While the Orange were controlling possession before Kocevski’s send-off. But afterward, the Cavaliers ended up with four more shots.

“I don’t think it was an overly physical game,” Syracuse head coach Ian McIntyre said. “I was a little bit disappointed with the number of yellow cards.”

During the first half, the referees whistled after nearly every instance of contact between the Orange and the Cavaliers. Sjoberg and Levonte Johnson were both called for fouls after shoves and Virginia’s Reese Miller was called for a sliding tackle against Noah Singelmann.

In the first 25 minutes alone, both teams combined for four cards. On the first card, goalie Russell Shealy had punted the ball back to midfield, but the Cavaliers got a head on it. The ball made its way to Virginia midfielder Albin Gashi, who Kocevski had covered. But as Gashi shifted forward, Kocevski moved his foot in, and the UVA midfielder fell to the ground.

Fourteen minutes later, Kocevski was penalized again. Virginia had a throw-in where Paul Wiese threw to Daniel Mangarov, who quickly passed to Axel Ahlander. As Ahlander tapped the ball back to Wiese, Kocevski put his elbow into his back, causing Ahlander to fall to the ground and sending the SU junior to the bench for the rest of the night.

By the time of Kocevski’s second card, the Orange had the better scoring opportunities between the two teams. Ten minutes into the match, Kocevski flicked a ball to fellow midfielder Colin Biros, who had an open shot. Biros’ shot was high and hit the top of the post. As the Cavaliers went on the man-advantage, though, the possessions started to go Virginia’s way. UVA’s Kome Ubogu took a long, high pass from the midfield and streaked down the left side of the pitch. Ubogu took the shot from the top left corner of the box, but Shealy stopped the attempt with his gloves, sending the two teams into halftime tied.

The Cavaliers started the second half by being the first team to get a shot on net. Obogu dribbled near the top of the box and had a point blank opportunity. But Olu Oyegunle and Sjoberg quickly threw their bodies in front of the shot, deflecting the ball away from the net.

With under 28 minutes left in the half, Weise sent a long, low pass down to Asparuh Slavov, who was a step ahead of Oyegunle. Slavov took a quick shot in the box, but Shealy, who was down on one knee, gained control of the ball.

Aside from straight-up shots, Virginia generated many of its opportunities through set pieces. With 12 minutes remaining in the match, Mangarov got a free kick after backup SU forward Francesco Pagano lightly tapped Ahlander. Mangarov curled the ball to the right where a header missed the net. Despite the miss, Shealy rushed to dive on the ball because Ahlander was in his vicinity.

“They’re a good team, they have a lot of big players,” Sjoberg said. “(They use) set pieces and they like to put the ball in the box.”

Even when Shealy wasn’t explicitly stopping shots, he was facing pressure on many of his goal kicks and punts. Multiple times during the match, Shealy kicked the ball away with a Virginia player close by, which led to kicks that gave possession right back to UVA, eventually leading to Afonso’s score.

Despite Afonso’s score, SU had two opportunities to get a goal in the final 10 minutes. Singelmann sent a long kick down to Nathan Opoku, who headed the ball back to Curti. Curti took a shot from outside the box that Virginia keeper Holden Brown easily leaped up and caught.

But the Orange had one final shot that came close to tying the match. Opoku got his head on a Shealy goal kick and passed to Curti, who quickly got the ball to Levonte Johnson. Johnson leaped over the ball to roll it forward for Opoku. After facing pressure, Opoku and the Orange reset, giving possession to Giona Leibold, who promptly took a shot that gave UVA the ball back.

“The guys were awesome all game,” Shealy said. “But it’s just one little moment where you get beat and then the guy just has a great shot.”

Published on September 24, 2022 at 11:03 pm

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