By Steve Marcus
Staff Writer
The Bonnies (3-10, 1-2) suffered a 3-1 conference setback to Duquesne (5-8, 2-1) Sunday afternoon. The loss drops the men into a tie for 10th place in the Atlantic 10. The top eight teams make the postseason tournament.
Two more key conference games take place this weekend at McGraw-Jennings Field as the men welcome Dayton (7-3-1, 1-1-1) today at 3 p.m. and 13th ranked (NCAA) Xavier (9-0-3, 2-0-1) Sunday at 1 p.m.
Dayton enters the game after going 1-1 last weekend, suffering a 1-0 loss Friday night against Saint Louis and tying Xavier 2-2 on Sunday. The Dayton offense is led by junior Abe Keller. The Switzerland native leads the team with 17 points on six goals and five assists. Senior Daniel Berko has also made strides in the Flyer’s offense with 14 points, on five goals and four assists.
Xavier comes in as one of the hottest teams not just in the Atlantic 10, but also in the nation. The Musketeers are led by conference goals leader senior Luke Spencer, who has 21 points on the season with nine goals and three assists. They have seven players who have found the back of the net and five players who have three goals or more.
Last Sunday, the Bonnies tried to key on slowing down the Dukes main offensive threat, senior Joshua Patterson. However, Patterson couldn’t be contained and scored two goals giving him 10 on the year.
Just 17 minutes into the game the Bonnies found themselves down 1-0. Nine minutes later, the Dukes struck again as defender Nathan McCann headed in a cross. The Bonnies’ lone scoring chance of the first half came in the 43rd minute when junior Daniel Iannacito struck a ball from junior Emmett O’Connor, however Iannacito was called offside and the goal did not count.
At the half, sophomore goalkeeper Bobby Diaz replaced senior Abel Bautista in net, marking the first time in six games Bautista didn’t play the full 90 minutes. The Bonnies would finally breakthrough in the 67th minute as a corner by junior James Reed resulted in a scrum in the box where junior Kaine Moar scored his second goal of the season.
Reed was disappointed after Sunday’s result and said this week of practice will be crucial heading into a big weekend.
“Well, we were disappointed to come up short on Sunday, especially for having outplayed them in the second half,” Reed said. “We’re really looking to create more chances through transition play and be able to finish at a higher rate. We also need to tighten up in the back going up against two strong teams.”
Junior defender Brad Beaumont said finishing chances is a key for this weekend.
“Getting back on track we need to finish our chances,” Beaumont said. “We have the players who can do it; we just need to get it done. This is a big weekend for us and I believe that we are ready to play two of the better teams in this league.”
