UVU Men’s Soccer Smashes Massachusetts in First Home Match

Tim Castaneda, Sports Writer, @xTIMBOxSLICEx

Photos: Brooke Morrill, Photo Director, @brookemorrill

UVU Men’s Soccer earned its first victory for the program by defeating the University of Massachusetts by a score of 5-1 in a history making Saturday evening at Clyde Field. In its inaugural match as a member of the Western Athletic Conference, the team kicks off it’s program and season on the right foot with a high scoring win over this non-conference opponent.

In spite of being young and inexperienced, the UVU squad showed its aggression on the attack early in the match to get the win over the more experienced UMASS. The history making fist goal for UVU came after 5 minutes of play by Karson Payton on the from mid-fielder Paul Hoffmeister. The veteran UMASS squad didn’t wait long to respond with a goal of its own by Mark Morris who scored on a header from a long pass on the right side in the 12th minute.

The Wolverines regained the lead for the rest of the match scoring three more goals in the first half to take a commanding 4-1 lead into halftime. The second goal for the team came off a deflection from UMASS keeper Taylor Kulp’s gloves and was kicked in by Matt Gay. Later in the half the squad delivered its third goal of the night from a beautiful display of passing from forward Thomas Loomis and Hoffmeister that set up forward Austin Buxton for the score into the lower left side of the net. Mid-fielder Lucas Cawley scored UVU’s fourth goal two minutes before half to put his team up by 3 goals.

In the second half UMASS was unable to score in large part to stellar play from the UVU defense. The comeback attempt by UMASS proved unsuccessful after the team couldn’t find the net the rest of the game with only two shots on goal and allowed Gay to score UVU’s fifth and final goal at the 61 minute mark.

UVU men’s soccer takes its 1-0 regular season on the road to Chicago, Illinois to face DePaul at 5:00 p.m. MT on Friday, September 5th.