WILKES-BARRE, Pa. – Despite outshooting King's (Pa.) College by a 17-9 margin in the second half, the Union College men's soccer team could not dig out of an early second-half hole in suffering a 3-1 loss to the host Monarchs on Wednesday evening at McCarthy Stadium.
First-year
Josiah Blake scored his fourth goal of the season as part of the comeback attempt, but Union (4-3) was done in by three King's goals in the span of 7:03 early in the second half. The visitors finished the game with 21 shots over the 90 minutes, but eight saves by King's keeper Ben Van Valkenburg kept the home team in front.
The teams combined for 10 shots in a scoreless first half, with Van Valkenburg (three) and Union first-year
Michael Karcher (four) combining for seven saves to keep the sheet clean.
The second half started disastrously for the Garnet Chargers, as the Monarchs scored 67 seconds into the frame and then again 25 seconds later to quickly take a two-goal lead. Santiago Javadpour had both goals for the home team. Union responded with five shots over the next six minutes, but soon after that flurry ended King's (3-2-1) got another goal from Anthony Ramirez to increase its advantage.
The visitors continued to press, but only managed to get one shot into the back of the net, coming from Blake in the 75th minute.
Karcher finished the match with six saves for Union, while Blake had a team-leading five shots and four on-target attempts.
Union will return to Schenectady to finish the home portion of its non-conference slate on Saturday with a 2 p.m. kickoff against Plattsburgh State University.
