On a windy Saturday night at Hodges Stadium, the University of North Florida men’s soccer team defeated Jacksonville University by the score of 2-0 to sweep the season series over their cross-town rivals.
With the win, UNF clinches the graphite division and secures a spot in the ASUN men’s soccer championship. After dominating the shot count for the first 20 minutes, UNF scored two goals in three minutes, which was enough to remain undefeated at home.
First Half
Five different Ospreys launched shots in the first 15 minutes, including two saved by JU goalkeeper Christian Sekanina. For the next 10 minutes, Jacksonville held UNF shotless, while producing three of its own shots.
All-ASUN goalkeeper Luciano Natoli helped keep the game scoreless, saving two JU shot attempts and adding to his team’s lead in that category. Whenever it felt like the momentum swung into JU’s favor, UNF always seemed to have an answer.
Two minutes after Natoli’s save, junior midfielder Tyler Prebenda placed a ball inside the small box. Then, a Jacksonville player kicked the ball towards its own goalkeeper, resulting in an own goal.
Trailing 1-0, JU flipped the field, firing off a shot just nearly two minutes removed from the own goal. However, UNF’s offensive attack continued to be relentless, creating its own set piece just minutes later.
In the 35th minute, sophomore midfielder Anton Khelil received an on-target pass from fifth-year midfielder Rentaro Miyakawa, netting his second goal of the season on a banger just outside the wide box.
Khelil even caught head coach Jamie Davies off guard with his long-range goal.
“I thought he was going to pass it and then he shot it,” Davies said. “He’s been having a couple of them in training, so he did very well.”
Now leading 2-0 with ten minutes left in the first frame, JU attempted a pair of shots minutes following the goal, but both attempts were well saved once again.
Despite most of the stats, whether it be shots or corners, being fairly even, UNF headed to the locker room leading its rival in shutout fashion.
Second Half
Looking for shutout number eight this season, JU came out of halftime with a different edge, tallying two corner kicks and two shots in the first five minutes. Overall, between minute 45 and minute 60, Jacksonville took three shots and had a trio of corner kicks.
During the 64th minute, redshirt senior Luc Granitur was issued a yellow card, marking the first and only caution issued to either team. Both teams traded fouls for the rest of the game, resulting in over double the fouls compared to the first half.
As the game neared its end, Jacksonville only took one shot in the final 30 minutes of play, a testament to how well UNF performed defensively.
Coach’s Comments
“You play your rivals at home and you have a chance to win the league in this game against them, you put your body on the line,” Davies said, referring to how his defenders played. “You just saw that tonight.”
Davies said post-game that he knew JU was going to press more in the final frame. Ultimately, though, Davies said they took care of business in the first half, allowing his team more leeway for mistakes.
“We kind of did the job in the first half to be honest,” Davies said. “The boys were very good.”
While Davies said “he’s proud of the guys,” the second-year coach still believes there’s more to be accomplished.
“The job’s not done yet, so we’re gonna stay humble,” Davies said. “We’re going to keep getting better. We’ve gotta look at what we didn’t do quite well tonight.”
UNF improves to 11-4 and Jacksonville drops to 4-7-4. Currently, UNF leads the ‘River City Rumble’ record 2-1. JU’s next opportunity to even the record is next Thursday when UNF volleyball hosts the Dolphins at UNF Arena.
UNF will finish off the regular season traveling down south to face Stetson. Kickoff is set for Saturday, November 1, at 7 p.m. in DeLand, Florida.
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