Twenty-four hours after knocking off No. 18 Utah State-Eastern, the Western Nebraska Community College men’s soccer team could only muster a 3-3 tie with Northwest College on Friday at the Landers Soccer Complex.
Friday’s contest was one where the Cougars started strong, but faded late.
It took the Cougars less than 20 seconds to score the first goal as Maxime Niyibaho dished a pass to Eduardo Oliveira and the sophomore put the ball past the goalkeeper in the upper-right corner for the 1-0 lead.
WNCC went up 2-0 with 20 minutes to play in the opening half when Guilherme Lindolfo scored after getting the ball from Oliveira to make it 2-0.
After that, things went Northwest’s way as the Trappers scored on a penalty kick when Pedro Teixeira scored with 18:18 to play to make it 2-1. WNCC also had to play a man down because of a red card.
Things evened out, though, as Northwest went a man down after one of their players was issued a red card and both teams played 10-on-10 the rest of the half and into the second half. Northwest tied the game at 2-2 with 12 minutes to play in the first half on a Kasey Smith goal off an assist from Teixeira.
The second half saw WNCC score quick when Isrrael Rodriguez scored just three minutes into the second half for a 3-2 lead.
The lead stayed in favor of the Cougars until the 35th minute. That was when things got exciting. Northwest was issued a penalty kick and Tomas Guzman made a brilliant save to thwart the goal. But, on the play, WNCC was issued a red card giving Northwest another penalty kick and this time Pedro Nunez put the ball into the back of the net.
For the final 35 minutes, WNCC played with just nine players to Northwest’s 10 and came close of taking the lead with 25:39 to play as shot just went high. Three minutes later, WNCC had another shot that just missed.
Northwest had two golden opportunities to score in the final two minutes with back-to-back corner kicks, but the Cougars defense stepped up and avoided the goals to collect the tie.
WNCC had 10 shots in the contest compared to seven for Northwest. Northwest and WNCC each had three corner kicks.
The WNCC men will be back in action with a scrimmage in Rapid City, South Dakota, on Monday and they return to regular season next weekend when they travel to Council Bluffs, Iowa, to face two ranked teams in Iowa Western Community College and Indian Hills Community College.
