Visiting Friends' second-half flurry sends Bulldogs to defeat

SEWARD, Neb. – An air-tight first half Bulldog defense let down its guard in the second half and a solid Friends squad took advantage. The visiting Falcons came alive early in the second half and claimed a 3-0 victory over Concordia (2-3) inside Bulldog Stadium on Friday afternoon.

“We pressed them pretty well in the first half and defensively, didn’t give them a whole lot,” Concordia head coach Jason Weides said. “We just need to really improve our attack in transition. Unfortunately, second half we just didn’t do that. The big story today was we just weren’t at our best.”

Through most of Friday afternoon, Concordia registered few chances on the attack with senior Nathan Douglas looking to break the program career record for goals scored. Douglas remains at 31 career goals, tied with Bernie Ochoa (2000-02) and Aaron Skipworth (2008-11, 2012).

Concordia missed out on a golden opportunity in the seventh minute when the Bulldogs had numbers on the attack. Douglas found junior Chris DeFeyter to his right, but DeFeyter’s clean look at the goal resulted in a shot wide to the right, proving Weides’ point about the need for better play in transition.

“It’s execution mostly,” Weides said. “The decisions we make – both with the person on the ball and decisions they make in the passes, and also our runs. Our runs sometimes dictate what the ball should be. We were a little too eager to get behind them.”

Douglas, who hails from Winnipeg, Canada, had a great scoring chance of his own when he found himself with only the keeper to beat early in the second half. However, Douglas booted the ball right to goalkeeper Marko Nedeljkov. Douglas was denied again late in the second half on a header off a corner kick.

Both teams remained scoreless until the 48th minute when Friends’ junior midfielder Lucas Coelho got a clean look at the goal and took advantage by grounding the ball into the back of the net. Then in the 61st minute, the Falcons got similar-looking goals from Jamie Dowsett and Daniel Littler. Both scored after rebounding their own misses.

Friends ended up with 13 shots (six on goal) compared to six (two on goal) for Concordia. Junior Rajan Kooner led Concordia with two shots.

Freshman Mark Horsburgh saw his first collegiate action on Friday. He relieved Brendan Buchanan in goal for the final 7:40 of play.

The Bulldogs continue nonconference action on Saturday when they battle Sterling College (Kan.) in a contest set to begin at 2:15 p.m. Although the Warriors fell to Midland on Friday, Weides expects Sterling to present a challenge much like what his team faced against Friends.

“It’s going to be similar to Friends,” Weides said. “They’re in the KCAC – a strong team. I think it’s another team that will be good moving forward. It will be really important for us to be more successful in attacking in transition.”