Three members of the Boston University men’s soccer team sat without moving or speaking on the team bench after the Terriers’ 2-1 loss to the University of Maryland-Baltimore County on Wednesday. They were visibly disappointed, staring blankly at the turf of Nickerson Field with watery eyes.
‘Come on guys, let’s go,’ BU coach Neil Roberts said to them in an almost hushed tone.
Still, they did not move. Only with a second urging from their coach did they stand up and trudge wearily across the field back to the locker room.
The emotion of the Terriers’ game against the Retrievers was palpable. This was the team’s Senior Night, their final home game of the season and last chance to show the team’s most experienced players their appreciation on their own turf.
Instead, it became the fourth in a series of conference losses that have all but put the Terriers’ postseason hopes out of sight.
‘It’s disappointing that we have a very good team, and the kids are working hard, and its not coming for us right now,’ Roberts said after the game.
The talent level of this team is what has made the string of losses so hard to bear. Three of those most talented players sat silently on the bench after the game. Senior Samual Appiah and sophomores Michael Bustamante and Ben Berube, players who had put so much effort into this season, saw two month’s work come crashing down in four games.
Wednesday’s game was one of the Terriers’ last opportunities to lay claim to a spot in the America East Tournament. The top six teams in the conference move on to play in the postseason.
Before the loss, the Terriers were seventh and UMBC was sixth. A win could have given BU that extra push it needed to just make it into the tournament.
Granted, the Terriers would also more than likely need wins in their final two games of the season to secure their place. But 2-3 is much more stable ground to launch a late season push than is 1-4.
‘ The Terriers’ game against UMBC in many ways paralleled a season gone horribly awry. BU started the first half of its season with an impressive romp through its non-conference schedule, starting conference play with a 6-2-2 record led by offensive powerhouse junior Aaron O’Neal. Wednesday’s game started in much the same way with a well-executed goal from O’Neal.
In both cases, all seemed right with the world ‘-‘- the star junior was scoring, the Terriers cruising. Then heartbreak happened.
BU dropped four straight games, including Wednesday’s game, in America East play and dropped off the college soccer map. Similarly, 30 seconds after O’Neal’s goal against UMBC, the Retrievers fired back with one of their own, and scored another four minutes later.
The hard-fought season unraveled in four games. The game plan imploded in just under five minutes.’ ‘
Senior goaltender Hrafn Davidsson’s reaction to the Retrievers’ second goal of the night said it all: frustration.’
UMBC junior Dustin Dzwonkowski, uncontested and very much unharried, calmly and precisely lined up his shot directly in front of the net about 20 yards away from Davidsson. All the veteran goaltender could do was throw up his hands in disgust as he watched the ball land in the back of the net.
‘We see a season that, if it’s not gone [already], is getting away very quickly,’ Roberts said.
The 25-year head coach knows his team’s chances of getting into the postseason are slim. Any more mistakes in the Terriers’ final two games means their America East title defense is indisputably over.
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