Three Tulsa men’s soccer players scored a goal to give the Golden Hurricane a 3-0 win over Memphis on Saturday afternoon at the Mike Rose Soccer Complex in Memphis, Tenn.  TU moved to 7-6-3 on the season and concluded American Athletic Conference play with a 3-3-2 mark, while the Tigers fell to 3-9-4 overall and 1-4-3 in the league.

 

“The individual performances were very good today,” Head Coach Tom McIntosh said.   “Our movement was good in transition.  We created a good counter attack with a break-a-way and Memphis received a red card and had to play down for 70 minutes.  We showed a good combination of patience and urgency, which is hard to do when you play up a man.  Our guys showed good composure.  Dillon scored a great goal from 30 yards out, then Juan and Michael took their chances exceptionally well.  I though we could have defended better individually today, but as a unit we did well.”

 

With the win, the Golden Hurricane clinched a top-four seed in The American Championship, and will host a quarterfinal game on Saturday, November 7 beginning at 6:00 pm at the Hurricane Soccer and Track Stadium.  The opponent will be announced after all regular season games have been concluded.

 

“We had to adjust our season goal for the right to host a quarterfinal game and the guys were able to achieve that.  I am proud of them and we’ve earned that right, but now we have to take advantage of the opportunity.  We just need to keep growing as a team and get ourselves prepared for whoever we will play next Saturday.”

 

Dillon Alexander put Tulsa on the board with 29:54 ticked off the clock as he drilled in a long ball into the top shelf.  Alexander’s goal, the first of his career, gave TU a 1-0 advantage at the break.

 

Juan Sanchez picked up a cross from Lesley Nchanji at the back post and fired it into the goal in the 58^th minute, and then Michael Mitrik one-timed the ball into the back of the net off a cross from Zach Jackson to put TU up 3-0 at the 75:49 mark.

 

Tulsa had a 16-4 lead in shots, including a 10-2 advantage in shots on goal, and an 8-0 lead in corner kicks.

 

Geoffrey Dee had a team-best four shots, while Jackson and Sanchez added two attempts.  Jake McGuire logged all 90 minutes in goal, picked up two saves and earned his second shutout on the season.

 

Scoring Summary

Tulsa               1          2          -           3

Memphis        0          0          -           0

 

Individual Scoring

Dillon Alexander (Tulsa) at 29:54 (Munashe Raranje)

Juan Sanchez (Tulsa) at 57:16 (Lesley Nchanji)

Michael Mitrik (Tulsa) at 75:49 (Zach Jackson)

 

Goalkeeper Saves

Jake McGuire (Tulsa) – 2

Jake Leeker (Memphis) – 5

 

-TulsaHurricane.com-