Wayland Baptist surrendered its claim as the last unbeaten Sooner Athletic Conference men's soccer team, but not without a valiant fight.
The Pioneers hosted 23
rd-ranked Mid-America Christian
on Tuesday evening at Hilliard Field, and after taking an early 1-0 lead gave up a pair of well-played goals as the Evangels went back to Oklahoma City with a 2-1 victory.
"I'm very proud of the performance today. We were brave all game trying to get forward when we had the ball. We lost concentration twice and we were punished; otherwise, it was a game I thought we should have won considering the opportunities we had," WBU coach
Robert Ssejjemba said.
The loss dropped Wayland to 5-1-2 on the season and 1-1 in the SAC, while MACU improved to 8-1 and 2-0 with its fifth straight win.
Tuesday's outcome was the third consecutive time the Evangels have beaten Wayland by a single goal. They did it twice last season, first 1-0 in Oklahoma City then by the same 2-1 count as Tuesday in the semifinals of the SAC Tournament in Plainview to end the Pioneers' season.
Three-time defending SAC regular-season champion Wayland went up 1-0 when
James Westfield passed upfield to
Hector Romero who sent the ball acrose the face of the MACU goal where senior
Santiago Pereyra punched it in. It was Pereyra's fifth goal of the season, second on the team only to Westfield's nine.
The Evangels, who boast a roster of a dozen players standing 6-foot or above, got the equalizer in the 37
th minute when Rodrigo Albuquerque, a sophomore from Brazil, scored his fifth goal of the season on the heels of a hard cross from the left side from Caleb Roldan, which Albuquerque was able to get a foot on from a few feet away.
The game-winner for the Evangels occurred in the 70
th minute when Fabian Forisch, a freshman from Germany, got off a bullet shot from 20 yards out almost directly in the center of the goal. Despite a diving save effort by WBU keeper
Gonzalo Santa, the ball slipped into the left side of the goal.
MACU was credited with 11 shots, one more than Wayland, and six shots on-goal, twice as many as the Pioneers. Pereyra led the Pioneers with three shots, followd by Eric Luzanilla with two. Seven different Pioneers fired shots.
Although Wayland didn't score after halftime, Ssejjemba felt his team played its best after intermission.
"The second half was our best, I thought. We took better care of the ball and stretched the field really well, forcing MACU to drop very deep defensively. It was that final touch that was missing, but we did everything we talked about and worked on all week in training.
"It was a proper game of soccer and a great team effort."
The Pioneers, who were playing for the first time since a 6-0 win over Oklahoma-Panhandle State in their SAC debut, now take another week off before hitting the road for
a 3 p.m. match
next Tuesdayin Waxahachie against Southwestern Assemblies of God (1-7-1, 1-0), which defeated Texas Wesleyan, 3-1, for their first win of the season a week ago in their conference opener. The Lions play at Southwestern Christian (3-4, 1-0) on Saturday.
Wayland is next at home for
a 3 p.m. game
Oct. 12 against Central Christian (4-4-1, 0-1).
