By Troy Langstaff
The Dalhousie Tigers men's soccer team got their first win of the season on Saturday afternoon over the Memorial Sea-Hawks by a score of 3-1 at Wickwire Field. This was the lone match-up between the two squads this season.
Memorial, who was undefeated in their first two regular season games, came out of the gates with lots of momentum and had the Tigers on their heels early. The Sea-Hawks controlled the play and forced Dalhousie goalkeeper Aiden Rushenas (Toronto, ON) to fight off multiple great scoring chances.
Dalhousie converted on their first chance of the game in the 9' minute of play off a hard accurate shot into the bottom right corner by Ayoub Al-Arabi (Halifax, NS).
Memorial didn't let the goal phase them as they continued the strong offensive play with chance after chance being halted by the Dalhousie defenders or Rushenas himself who would end up having five saves in the first half alone.
The Tigers would increase their lead to two in the 42' minute when Luke Berryman (Halifax, NS) netted his first goal of the year. Only one minute later Berryman found himself with a chance to further extend the lead after he flipped the ball over the Sea-Hawks goalie Dylan Crichton (Torbay, NL) forcing defender Harry Carter (St. Johns, NL) to clear the ball on the goal line.
Dalhousie led 2-0 after 45 minutes of play.
The second half started with a penalty kick awarded to Memorial in the 48' minute. Rushenas made the initial stop on the penalty kick but Carter would pounce on his own rebound to get the Sea-Hawks within one.
The Tigers would get a penalty kick of their own in the 62' minute when Gracious Kasheke (Halifax, NS) was taken down in the box. Ayoub Al-Arabi would step up to the spot and pot his second goal of the game with a perfectly placed shot into the top left corner.
The rest of the second half was filled with back and forth play with Dalhousie focusing on holding their lead and Memorial forcing plays to try and get back into the game.
The final ten minutes of play started to get chippy with one player on each team receiving a yellow card.
Dalhousie would go on to win the game by a score of 3-1 handing Memorial their first loss of the season. Ayoub Al-Arabi was the AUS SUBWAY Player of the Game.
Memorial is back in action tomorrow afternoon when they face off against St. Mary's at 2:45pm.
The Tigers next match comes on September 25th when they host Moncton at 5:15pm.