The UNM men’s soccer team gave up four goals in a game for the first time all season in a losing effort to the Washington Huskies, ending their season two rounds into the NCAA Tournament on Sunday night.
The Lobos (12-7-3) took a 4-1 loss to the Huskies (14-6-0), snapping an eight match undefeated streak.
Sunday's result was not how head coach Jeremy Fishbein wanted to end the season, but he said the loss wouldn’t take away from all the positives he saw during the year.
"I'm really proud of this team," Fishbein said in a statement after the match. "We're not going to let today’s result define who we are or define the season. I think at some point, five games in 12 days is just a mental and physical toll of things.”
The Lobos scored the first goal of the night during the 22nd minute. Midfielder Patrick Khouri scored his first goal of the season with the help of forward Niko Hansen.
Entering the contest, UNM had only lost one game this season after scoring first in a match. But unfortunately for the Lobos, that trend did not hold true on Sunday.
A few minutes after Khouri’s goal, Hansen, from a counter attack, was on his way to scoring a second goal for his team. However, the execution wasn’t perfect and the ball ended up going too wide on the left side.
Justin Schmidt found the equalizer for the Huskies in the 28th minute off a corner kick.
Neither team was able to add to the total in the rest of the 45-minute period. The first half ended tied 1-1, with Washington outshooting New Mexico 7-3.
The Huskies took control of the second half as soon as the period began. A goal by Scott Menzies in the 47th minute put them up 2-1.
In the 57th minute, Elijah Rice increased this lead to 3-1, and just to make sure the Lobos didn’t have a chance to rally, Beau Blanchard put the game out of reach in the 65th minute.
New Mexico only registered two shots in the second half as the Huskies made their run. The final box score showed Washington’s dominance as the Huskies outshot the Lobos 16-5.
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“(Washington) got that early goal in the second half and then it just got away from us in that little 10 minute period, but I'm proud of these guys,” said Fishbein in his statement. “Now we just need to sit back and reflect on our success, appreciate our five seniors and everything we've done and then continue to move on."
Isabel Gonzalez is a sports reporter for the Daily Lobo. She mainly covers men’s soccer and basketball. She can be reached at sports @dailylobo.com or on Twitter @cisabelg.
