Box Score SAINT LEO, Fla. - With the chance to win the Sunshine State Conference regular season on the line, the Eckerd College men's soccer team faced an early uphill climb.
The Tritons almost did it, pulling back within a goal after falling behind 3-0, but ultimately fell on the road to Saint Leo on Thursday night, 4-2.
Eckerd (8-5-1, 4-3-1) went into the night with a chance to clinch the SSC regular season title with a win coupled with a Tampa loss. The Spartans, who started an hour earlier, lost to Lynn on a pair of late goals to open the door for the Tritons.
After Saint Leo took a three-goal lead on a score in the 47th minute, the Tritons stepped it up and quickly cut the deficit to one behind two
Richard Ainscough goals. Eckerd kept the pressure on afterward, taking four more shots but couldn't net the equalizer.
The Lions (9-5, 5-2) opened the match quickly, getting on the board in the second minute when Brandon Rivera finished off a rebound of a Maximilian Schulze-Geisthovel free kick. Schulze-Geisthovel then scored a goal of his own in the 18th minute to make it 2-0.
That score held until halftime, but SLU struck again early in the second half as Schulze-Geisthovel again had a hand in a goal sending a cross into the box to Matthias Katerna who finished it off to extend the Lions' lead to 3-0.
Eckerd broke the shutout in the 60th minute when Ainscough converted a free kick from just outside the box. He struck again moments later, taking a cross from
Matheus Assumpcao and putting it into the net in the 69th minute to get Eckerd back within a goal.
But Schulze-Geisthovel gave the Lions a cushion in the 87th minute as he finished off a corner kick, pushing the lead to 4-2 with under three minutes left, and the Tritons got no closer.
Eckerd will enter next week's conference tournament as the No. 5 seed. EC finished tied for fourth with Lynn but the Knights earned the tiebreaker by virtue of their head-to-head win over the Tritons.
