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Cardinal Roster
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Cardinal Statistics
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Cardinal Schedule
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MIAC Standings
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MIAC Statistics
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| 2005 Records: 4-5-0 MIAC, 4-8-1 Overall |
| Last Week's Results: St. John's 2, Saint Mary's 0 / Details |
| Upcoming Events: Tues., Oct. 25: SMU at Bethel, 3:30 p.m. Fri., Oct. 28: SMU at CS-Hayward, noon Sun., Oct. 30: SMU at UC-Santa Cruz, 2 p.m. |
| This and That: SMU's 2-0 setback to St. John's was the third straight 2-0 game for the Cardinals. … The loss to SJU snapped the Cardinals' two-game winning streak — SMU's longest since beating Bethel and Carleton on Oct. 11 and Oct. 15, 2003. … Tyler Kodet's first-half goal for SJU snapped SMU goalkeeper Ryan O'Connor's (San Diego, Calif.) shutout streak at 184:02. … The Cardinals have been held without a goal in six of their eight losses. … Mike Schmitt (Woodridge, Ill.) leads the Cardinals in goals (7) and points (15), while Tim Bollis (Milwaukee, Wis.) and Andy Kozar (Libertyville, Ill.) share the team lead in assists with three. … Last Saturday's game vs. SJU was the final collegiate home game for Cardinal seniors Kozar, Mike Boland (Lake Zurich, Ill.) and Jeff Kunick (Eau Claire, Wis.). |
playoff hopes are officially dashed with loss to SJU
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Ryan
O'Connor 6 saves in loss to SJU |
Unlike the previous two, however, the Cardinals found themselves on the short end of the final 2-0 score as St. John's scored a pair of first-half goals in beating SMU — snapping the Cardinals' two-game winning streak and dashing any hopes they may have had of playing in the MIAC tournament.
"I really felt like we were ready to play," said SMU coach Eric Luzzi. "In the locker room … our pregame … warm-ups — I really thought we were going to come out with an incredible amount of energy, and it just didn't happen."
It didn't help that the Johnnies broke the scoreless tie just four minutes into the game when Tyler Kodet netted his team-leading ninth goal, burying a shot past SMU goalkeeper Ryan O'Connor (San Diego, Calif.), who had stopped a point-blank shot by Tudor Flintham, only to have the rebound bounce right to Kodet.
"That goal really seemed to deflate us," said Luzzi, whose team had not given up a goal since early in the overtime period of a 2-1 loss to St. Thomas on Oct. 10. "We weren't able to create much offense, and the more we pressed, the more frustrated we seemed to get. Then, when they scored that second goal (off the foot of Jerry D'Alessandro at the 29:40 mark), it seemed like everyone decided that they wanted to fix (what was wrong) by themselves and we went totally away from all the things that we had been doing so well for the past month or so.
"This was not a very pretty game by any stretch of the imagination," said Luzzi, referring to the 42 fouls — including 10 yellow cards — that were called on the two teams. "It was an extremely physical game, and I think that got into our heads a bit."
O'Connor finished with six saves for the Cardinals, who close out their MIAC schedule at Bethel on Tuesday, before ending their season next weekend at Cal State-Hayward and UC Santa Cruz.
"We were really hoping to put a nice end to the home season — especially for our seniors," said Luzzi, whose three graduating seniors – Andy Kozar (Libertyville, Ill.), Mike Boland (Lake Zurich, Ill.) and Jeff Kunick (Eau Claire, Wis.) — were playing their final collegiate game at Ochrymowycz Field. "I'm not going to fault the effort, it's just the execution of our game plan that was lacking a bit."