Bowling Green State University Athletics
Falcons Clinch Share of MAC Regular Season Title
October 27, 2002 | Men's Soccer
Oct. 27, 2002
Bowling Green, Ohio - The Bowling Green State University men's soccer team clinched at least a share of the Mid-American Conference Regular Season Championship and the No. 1 seed in the upcoming MAC Postseason Tournament with a 1-0 victory over Akron on Sunday. The victory was played at BGSU's Mickey Cochrane Field.
With the win, BGSU finishes the 2002 portion of its league schedule with a 4-1-0 mark and 12 points (three points per victory). The best Akron (3-1-0) can do is tie the Falcons, who would win the tiebreaker for the No. 1 seed due to head-to-head competition. The Zips have one league game remaining with Kentucky (Nov. 1).
The game-winning goal for BGSU came off of the foot of junior Eric Duda at 69:21. Freshman Cory Stevens picked up a loose ball near the top of the box, passed to Duda who had positioned himself on the left-side of the box, and then fired to the far right corner of the net past UA goalie Dan Pinho. It was the transfer's first career goal at BGSU.
"He put himself in a great position and made a great shot," BGSU coach Mel Mahler said. "Duda was the player of the match. He did a great job of covering their top offensive threat (Harwat) and denying him the ball the entire match."
The game-winning shot by Duda was one of six shots in the second half by the Falcons. BGSU attempted just one shot in the first 45 minutes. Akron had three shots in the first half and five in the second half.
"They stuck to the gameplan for 90 minutes and did what we needed to do," Mahler said about his team. "I think our first-year players played with great composure and got better as the match went on."
Junior David DeGraff had four saves in net for BGSU to register his second shutout of the season and 13th of his career. Pinho had thee saves for Akron.
The regular-season title is BGSU's third since men's soccer became a MAC sport in 1993 (1996, 2000, 2002). The MAC Postseason Tournament will be held in Huntington, W.V. at Marshall University (Nov. 8-10). The highest remaining seed after Nov. 10 will host the MAC Tournament Championship on Saturday, Nov. 16, for a chance at an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.
"I'm really happy for the guys," Mahler said. "Anyone who has followed us this season knows that we've had a rough go. But...MAC Champions says it for itself."
Bowling Green (4-11-0 overall, 4-1-0 MAC) finishes its regular season next weekend when it hosts Michigan State (Nov. 1, 3:30 p.m.) and Cleveland State (Nov. 3, 2 p.m.) The match vs. CSU will be senior day for the Falcons.
