Bowling Green State University Athletics
Shoemaker Records First Shut-out as a Falcon in 3-0 Win Over Detroit
October 03, 2006 | Men's Soccer
Oct. 3, 2006
DETROIT - Paul Shoemaker made four saves en route to his first shut-out victory as a Falcon. Bowling Green (2-9-1) snapped a six-match losing streak in their 3-0 win over the University of Detroit (5-5-1) at Detroit's Titan Field. Of Detroit's last four matches, three have resulted in losses while another ended in a tie.
Tonight's win also ended a winless road streak dating back 29 matches to a 2-2 double overtime tie at Cleveland State on October 16, 2003. Entering the match, Bowling Green had not shut-out the Titans at home since September 25, 1997.
"It was a good game and in some ways it was the same as a lot of our previous matches," said Thompson. "As a young team we have to at least fight and claw in every match.
"We are working hard to rebuild the program so every match is about doing things right correctly; not necessarily just the end result. Tonight we played well and did enough of the right things to win."
Alec Perea's goal at the 37:19 mark gave BGSU the lead and was described by Thompson as simply beautiful.
George Davis IV took control of the offense from a throw-in from the left side of the field and proceeded to the end line. His pass found Perea approximately 16-18 yards in front of the Detroit defense. Perea stepped into the pass and pushed the ball passed the Detroit keeper to score.
"We had been practicing to find the open man and the score was executed perfectly. I stepped back after the goal and just thought, Wow. What a beautiful score," said Thompson.
The Falcons took the 1-0 lead in to the locker room at the half, and extended it to two in the 59th minute.
After stopping the attacking Titans in BG's territory, Alec Perea slid a pass to Justin Kim on the Orange and Brown counterattack where he converted a one-on-one situation with keeper Sasha Boskovic to the second Falcon goal.
Bowling Green sealed their fate minutes later as Cameron Hepple scored his first collegiate goal after just over an hour of play had expired. Once again Kim had a hand in raising the Falcons' score as he recorded the assist on the Hepple score. Kim currently leads the Falcons with eight points this season.
The Birds of Prey had begun a set offensive piece as Kim blasted a free kick into the Detroit defensive wall. Hepple found the rebound and solidified the win taking the ball to an empty net.
"Detroit is a very physical and direct team. Titan Field is not an easy place to play," said Thompson. "Everyone who played in tonight's match had at least one bag of ice on their body afterwards. It was a grueling battle."
The match recorded 47 total fouls. Twenty-seven, including two yellow cards, belonged to the Titans.
Tonight's win marks the second time in the past six years the Falcons have beat UD in their own stadium. In their last meeting in 2002, UD outscored the Falcons 4-1.
While the Falcons and Titans each took 12 shots in the match, eight of the Falcons shots were on goal compared to five from UD. Each squad pulled the trigger six times in each of the halves.
Bowling Green will return to conference play when Buffalo visits Mickey Cochrane Field on Friday afternoon. The Mid-American Conference match will begin at 3:00 p.m.
