Sept. 18, 2005

Contact: Brian Wolff

Final Stats

GREEN BAY, Wis. - The Cleveland State men's soccer team dropped its fifth consecutive match on Sunday, 5-1 to UW-Green Bay. The contest was the Horizon League opener for each team and the first conference match to be played on the season.

The Vikings fell early to the Phoenix 2-0 before sophomore Nick Weiner scored his first goal of the season in the 31st minute and cut the UW-Green Bay lead to 2-1. The goal was the first of Weiner's career. Weiner took a header off a cross from Steve Trapp who got the ball from Cormac Finn. It was Trapp's second assist and team-leading sixth point. For Finn it was his first point of the season.

"After we were down early we got back into the match with Nick's goal and were playing reasonably well," head coach Pete Curtis said. "It looked like we were going to get something good today, but when we got down again we didn't have the experience to get back into the match."

The Phoenix scored one minute later to increase their lead to two once again.

Freshman Anthony DeMarco recorded double-digit save for the first time in his young career, finishing with 10 in the match.

CSU was outshot, 30-8 and has given up an average of 20.7 shots per match.

"We have to play better defense," Curtis said. "Having Kim Kroken out the last couple of matches has hurt us, but we need to find ways to stop the other team."

The Vikings held UW-Green Bay scoreless for almost 20 minutes in the second half, but a goal in the 65th minute and the 80th minute, respectively, gave the Phoenix the four goal advantage.

"We have had some opportunities to score lately, but we aren't capitalizing on those chances," Curtis said. "We just have to get back out there and prepare for Duquesne."

The Vikings will end a three match road swing on Thursday, Sept. 22 at Duquesne. CSU returns home on Thursday, Sept. 29 for a conference matchup against defending champion UW-Milwaukee. Both matches begin at 7:00 p.m.