JACKSONVILLE, Ill. – The Illinois College men's soccer team made it through 110 minutes of a physical battle with Manchester University on Sunday, ending the day with a 1-1 draw with the Spartans. The Blueboys now stand at 0-1-1 on the season.
After a pair of saves early on in the match by
Raul Rubalcava, Illinois College put its first goal of the season in the back of the net and took a 1-0 lead on a towering header from
Nick Walter. A foul gave the Blueboys a free kick in the Manchester half of the field and
Thomas Saitta delivered a perfect in-swinger to give the freshman defender a chance to rise up and put it home from just outside the six-yard box.
Not long after that,
Brady O'Connell was denied a second goal for the Blueboys when he struck the post. From that point on, it took a lot of hard work from Rubalcava to keep IC in the lead heading into halftime. Manchester had nine shots in the first 45 minutes with seven of them on-target, but the IC goalkeeper was there for all of them.
The tying goal for the Spartans came in the first four minutes after the break. Manchester strung together a few passes in the midfield before a ball was played centrally towards Max Baker. After the pass was pinged around the top of the 18-yard box, it deflected up into the air and Baker was able to pop the ball over the head of Rubalcava to make it 1-1.
Manchester would go on to put the ball in the back of the net twice more, but have both instances called back for offside.
Cade Trautvetter had the best chances for the Blueboys in the second half with two shots, one of which was saved and the other which ran across the face of goal. In overtime, Saitta was denied the winning score by the crossbar.
Trautvetter had a team-high three shots in the match for the Blueboys. Rubalcava ended with 11 saves on the afternoon.
Illinois College is back home on Thursday night, hosting Principia College at 7:30 p.m.
