MELBOURNE, Fla. (Men’s Soccer) – No. 20 Florida Tech was unable to find a goal despite outshooting Florida Southern 16-5 in the match. The Moccasins found the game’s only goal in the 61st minute to hand the Panthers their first loss of the season by a score of 1-0 on Saturday at Rick Stottler Field.

“It was an unfortunate goal that we conceded,” head coach Robin Chan said. “We had plenty of opportunities, but we were unable to execute. At the end of the day we have to look to ourselves to figure out what we can do better in these types of games.”

Florida Southern (2-6-1, 1-1-0 SSC) played Florida Tech (5-1-3, 2-1-2 SSC) to an even first half. The Panthers held a slight 5-2 advantage in shots at the break.

In the 61st minute, the Moccasins put the first goal on the scoreboard.

Mitchell Francois heeled the ball to Niklas Davidsson, who was streaking down the left side. Davidsson, approaching the endline, crossed the ball high and into the box. The ball found the Moccasins’ Ricky Marton in a crowd a players. Marton struck the ball into the back of the net to give Florida Southern a 1-0 lead and eventual win.

The Panthers fought back, outshooting the Moccasins by a margin of 9-2 over the final 29 minutes. But FIT was unable to beat Florida Southern’s Brent Theriault, who made all five of his saves in the second session.

Gary Ogilvie led the Panthers with seven shots, three on goal.

“It will be an important test for us to see how we counter from this going into the next game,” Chan said. “We have a week now to prepare [for the next match]. Hopefully we learned a lot from today and can be better for it.”

FIT will travel to Tampa one week from today for the team’s second meeting of the season. The teams ended in a 1-1 tie back on Sept. 12 at Rick Stottler Field. The Panthers and Spartans will kick off on Oct. 6 at 8 p.m.

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